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The first two episodes were promising but then it starts to fall apart. Too many unnecessary subplots, graphic violence and sex. Might as well be another Game of Thrones.

For example in episode 6, there is war on the horizon between Lord Toranaga (Sanada) and the council led primarily by Lord Ishido (Hira) but the focus here is on the negotiation of the price for the courtesan Kiku (Kouri) to spend a night with Blackthorne (Jarvis) in what is supposedly a seductive scene hence the title of the episode "Ladies of the Willow World." This happens after a major earthquake; Mariko's (Sawai) flashbacks; Lady Ochiba No Kata (Nikaido) plotting war - which are all glazed over subplots. The Noh theatre scene even has more screen time than the major storyline.

If it's not for Sanada, I would have stopped watching, even he seems bored. Another critic who read the book and watched the original 80's series commented that the writers must have skimped over the pages or didn't bother reading it altogether. This lack of research shows in the way the characters behave and talk as if they're in the 20th Century, not feudal Japan.

The characters are under developed, no chemistry between Mariko and Blackthorne. The Portuguese priests are sidelined when they are crucial to the story. Half way through, we're now learning of the link between Mariko and Ochiba and the latter's vengeance for Toranaga. The editing slices and dice up the scenes which makes the story confusing to follow. With four episodes to go, I'm not having high hopes. Such a wasted opportunity, could have been a standout series based on a best selling book or the Japanese history which should have provided a lot of material to get inspiration from. But alas, it's the 21st Century and it's all about instant gratification, lazy writing where truth doesn't matter anymore.

This is heavily borrowed from all the spies/special agent franchise from Mission Impossible, James Bond, Jason Bourne and Jack Ryan to name a few. It's like the Ghostbusters and Ocean's 8 reboots where the leads are all women instead of men. And the voice of feminism is so loud in the 355, it's hard to enjoy any part of it without the eye roll. There's a scene where CIA agent Mace (Chastain) lectures her colleague Nick (Stan) that she's done all the hard work, doesn't get paid for it but he's gotten all the credit which the writer was angling for housewives cheering for Mace fighting against the patriarchy?

The fight scenes are more misses than hit. Though the agents eventually win, the length of time it takes for a woman to beat up a man takes longer due to physical disadvantages and we all know what's coming, so we don't really care by the time we get there.

There a lots of holes in the plot, overall very gimmicky and cliche. A waste of talent. Chastain, Cruz, Kruger and Nyong'o couldn't save the movie jno matter how hard they tried when the story is as thin as the paper it's written on.

I haven't read the book but read the reviews after I watched the series. The book sounds like a soap opera by Garmus who seem to hate men, religion and had poured all her anger into her story that's inconsistent, not well written or researched - she clearly didn't stick to the advice of write what you know and she was born in the late 1950's so the least she could have done was a tonne of research. This would then explain why the show writers had little to work with as seen in the fluctuating plotline from episode to episode, the inaccurate behaviour of the characters living in the 1940's to 1950's.

The main theme is of a brilliant chemist, Elizabeth Zott's (Larson) struggle to achieve academic accolade in a sexist research department in a misogynistic era. In the first five minutes, we see she's a successful TV cook who uses her chemistry knowledge to teach the mass how to cook. This would have been delightful and witty for the rest of the series but unfortunately, the writers couldn't help themselves and thus the preaching and absurdity begins.

Zott's black neighbour, Harriet (Naomi King) is purely planted there to highlight racism but the writers don't go deeper than her fight against a proposed highway over her neighbourhood. She's a force to be reckon with, eloquent and poised, but suddenly, she's so cocky she's like one of the white men who tries to put women in their places. Harriet organises a protest after being inspired by MLK, sees fellow protestors arrested but it's all treated lightly and in the end, she loses her plight and all gets quietly swept under the rug while the focus is shifted back to Zott. It's such an embarassing plotline with no credibility whatsoever except for pure tokenism. If the proposed highway is such a threat, Zott would have been more involved because her house is opposite Harriet's but she doesn't seem too bothered that they are going to be homeless soon.

There's a whole episode where the dog 6:30 narrates how he was a military dog that eventually found his way to Zott's house and he should have protected Evans (Pullman) from his untimely death. The dog is a big feature in the book but the one episode dropped in like that just made the series odd and especially silly when 6:30 disappears altogether in the after episodes.

Each epsiode seem to be its own entity, they don't even appear in the right sequence. Evans dies early on but it's not until the last two epsidoes that his story is explained properly but only to introduce a wealthy heiress who turns out to be his biological mother (DeWitt) who was forced to give him up as a baby. Naturally she has her own research foundation and thus Zott is able to quit her TV show and go back to being a chemist waiting her professorship - so much for her own feminist struggle when she's merely handed the golden key by her deceased lover's mother.

The flat, stereotypes do nothing to make the series watchable or entertaining. Most of the men are either sexist, thieves or liars. And I still haven't figured out why there's a scene of Pullman showering in the lab, his nudity on display as if to serve the point that it's about time actresses don't have to be the ones to be naked but it's ill placed and doesn't serve the story. Lastly, Zott behaves more like a robot than a determined scientist. She lacks emotion until she's transformed by Evans, again so much for feminism and sticking it to the men.

Following the same formula of ticking the boxes and preaching to the masses, this is another failed series where the writers don't care for character or story development. Gone are the days when there's the motivation to write well, to entertain and humour. Now it's either virtue signalling or a mad roller coaster ride.

The two stars are for the dog and costumes, at the very least, they were nice to look at.

The theme of domestic violence dominates this beautifully crafted mini-series along with stolen generation endured by Aborigines. The racism issue is just in the right amount without it becoming too preachy. The scene where Twig (Purcell) shares a tender moment with other Aboriginal women grieving for her loss is very effective. More of this please instead of the 'white people invaded our country' lecturing.

The complex stories of June, Agnes, Alice, Candy Blue, Twig and Sarah are brought together through their connection to Clem, June's violent son. Weaver does a good job as the matriarch running a flower farm that is also a refuge for women (called flowers) who have escaped domestic violence. Hats off to her for trying to grasp the elusive Australian accent.

Agnes (Cobham-Hervey) is June's daughter-in-law whom the matriarch inadvertently played a role in her demise when June encouraged the courtship with Clem (Vickers) and in marriage, continue to suffer abuse. Her presence is limited but she does deliver as the suffering wife/mother who tries to protect her daughter Alice.

Alyla Browne as young Alice is incredible as the victim of abuse. She captures the innocence, fear and happiness all on her face, especially in her eyes. Alycia Debnam-Carey struggles a little as the grown up Alice because the script thins out from episodes 4 to 6. She runs away from the farm after discovering the secret that June had Oggi (Bennett) deported to Bulgaria so she wouldn't lose Alice to him - this storyline is rather weak. Alice arrives at 'Agnes Bluff' and finds a job as a park ranger where she meets Dylan (Zurita) and falls for him. In between her job, she parties with her colleagues and sees a lot of outback country. Meanwhile Dylan's true character unfolds itself in a predictable kind of way.

The stories are strong enough to stand on their own so there is no need for a lot of the arty inserts. The amount of ariel shots of rugged and beautiful Australiana must have added up to half an episode's worth. The scenes explaining the langauge of flowers should have been emphasised more but they got lost amongst the dozens of ariel shots, music/dance clips and long dreamy sequences, it's all too much and disjointed. Then there are details that are factually inaccurate that should not have been included for the sake of creating impact. Sarah (Keddie) being able to walk freely right into the hospital room where Clem's bagged body lies. Or June's box of evidence of her grandson, Charlie's survival made up of letters and medical records from the hospital's neonatal ICU is just clutching at straws. No medical insitution will ever allow patients or relatives access to medical records, let alone giving them out as keepsakes, period.

The writers did a good job showing the horrors and consequences of domestic violence but they waded a little too much in sending a message that a lot of men are violent or have the potential to be as shown by June's overall reaction to and perception of men, in particular her son and grandson. Yes, she did suffer at the hands of men but this prejudice that violent nature can be passed on to the point she cuts Charlie out of her life when she could have tried to get to know him to understand that he's nothing like Clem, does nothing to help the cause. She's punishing all men regardless.

In June's final narrative she calls for women to speak out so men will not get to "rewrite history or erase women" but it's not as simple as that when there are women who also perpetuates and excuses violent behaviour such as the female senior park ranger siding with Dylan after he attacks Alice because he's good in his job and would be hard to replace. Or that Agnes did next to nothing to protect young Alice and even Lulu (Awosoga) not warning Alice of Dylan's controlling nature until she finds out the hard way. Glaringly obvious is June not checking in on Agnes and Alice when she had suffered Clem's violent outburst herself.

To stop domestic violence, everyone regardless of gender or race need to do their part instead of being a silent bystander wishing it would all go away because it's too hard. It's not just about speaking out but it's also about breaking the chain of violence or preventing it from happening.

This series came up when I was searching for something else on IMDB. The high rating score plus the many seasons had me curious so I gave it a go.

The pilot episode started out promising. James Spader is a legend. He has the voice and face that you want to hate but yet you find yourself drawn to his character, hooked on what will he do that in all of his movies from Crash to Pretty in Pink to Mannequin. Then comes Megan Boone's FBI agent, Elizabeth "Lizzy" Keen and her bland to bad acting just pulls the whole show down with her.

Boone tries to be Clarice Starling from Silence of the Lambs combined with Dana Scully but her acting skills is a fraction of Jodie Foster and Gillian Anderson's. Her big puppy eyes seem to be the only emotion she has for such a complex character that faces FBI most wanted enemies, witnesses her husband get stabbed or calming a little girl with a bomb in her backpack. It could be the script that let her down because she behaves more like a kindergarten teacher than an FBI agent. It's painful to watch and I'm only on S1 Ep5.

I don't really see what the hype is and why it ran for so many seasons. The plotline weakens episode by episode to the point it's a a joke that the writers think viewers will just lap up the rubbish without questioning where is the logic, why are these FBI agents behaving like amateurs etc etc. I'm going to skip to the season where Keen gets killed and hopefully the show will be much improved from then on.

The first season is a big preachy mess. Every episode there's something to ram into the viewer's face.

The second season is toned down but the problem are the extra characters of Lisa, Seema, Nya and Che. Their stories are uninteresting and by adding so many characters, everyone else's story has limited air time. Without Catrall, there is no series but they've pushed through with it and it just doesn't work. SATC was about four women and their complex friendship with some very memorable moments. So far AJLT hasn't delivered anything riveting.

Episode 8 is truly awful when Carrie said she thinks her leaving Aidan for Big was a mistake. That's pretty low in wiping out Big's storyline from the original series, two movies and last season, after killing him off early on. Carrie and Big had a huge history and loads of fan rooting for them to end up together. How much do the writers hate Noth that they really want to completely wipe out his character because of some allegations?

Then strangely in Episode 9, Carrie is asked if she's divorced and she replies that she had a wonderful marriage but it was too short. So which is it? Did the writers feel remorseful or they had amnesia when they backtracked to Carrie and Big's big love story?

And so, this is what it has become. Sloppy writing, too many storylines that go nowhere. Even the chemistry between Aidan and Carrie has fizzled out that they try so hard by having Corbett walk around in pair of briefs to spice things up. The writers should just stop making more but I have a feeling they won't because I'm sure they think they still have a lot (of nothing) to sell.

I was never into Barbie as a child because I thought she's just a boring toy. The operative word being - toy. So when the controversy started about her impossibly small waist, sky high beauty standards, white skin and blonde hair, I thought some people just have too much time on their hands or because they're just jealous at someone else's success. It's easier to blast someone else's hard work rather than strike it out on your own and keep doing it.

The way children perceive toys remain unchanged. A young child who picks up a Barbie will not immediately think (if at all) they must aspire to have the doll's physique. Children play with toys out of enjoyment and by using their innocent imagination, they don't think about the underlying message or intention behind every toy. The politicising comes from some adults who can scream the loudest and longest. Ruth Handler created Barbie after seeing her daughter playing with a paper doll, she wasn't into politics or trying to change cultural standards.

Gerwig's Barbie is an example of an adult using a doll to scream her many, many lectures to the masses. The movie looks like it's for children and teenagers but the script is the opposite. This is where it becomes confusing and the storyline thin. Too many speeches aiming at the patriarchy control, pointing out that it's a sexist world controlled by men but showing all men in this movie as idiots.

The portrayal of men is very black and white stereotyping. Barbie (Robbie) goes into the real human world and she's heckled by men at the beach and if that's not a clear enough message, she visits a construction site where, you guessed it, the men starts to make derogatory comments as well. Then there's the Mattel HQ where it's of course run by men in suits who are naturally, idiots. One of the lower ranked male employee (Swindells) even say, "I'm a man with no power, does that make me a woman?" (What's with half of the Sex Education actors cast in this movie. The brilliant Ncuti Gatwa playing a hetero Ken!?)

At just under two hours, you can guess why that is - there's not much else going for it so the soundtrack plays a big part in driving the narrative to the point, you're wondering if this is a movie or a music channel. The second half descends into a weird but clumsy attempt at humour that a child would find boring.

Robbie and Gosling do a decent job with the flat material they were given. Barbie is an iconc doll and that's all she is, a toy - so a movie keeping to that theme without the controversy would have been more entertaining. And in case you're so numb from all the preachiness, the Trump and his wall sideswipe under a guise of a joke shows how the writers just wanted to cover as many 'isms' as possible by using Barbie as a prop.

Having just watched halfway through the second episode, I keep thinking how much alike Heartbreak High is to Sex Education, Euphoria and especially Class of '07 which is another Australian series. But unlike SE and Euphoria where there is character development, complex storylines and actors who can act, this series has nothing going for it but is just one long music soundtrack.

The writers merely borrowed from other teenage series, and are so lazy that they have neglected even the basic of details - Hartley High only seem to have two teachers and a janitor running it, where are the other adults, even if they just walk around in the background. The students are either very immature or over the top with their 'ism' issues.

Another user commented that Australian TV and movie production have tanked and I couldn't agree more. It's churning out the same formula, afraid to be different and unique despite being on the other side of the planet, away from Hollywood. That formula (also used in Class of '07) involves lots of swearing because it's what Australians are known for, cracking the larrikin jokes aplenty and lots of virtue signalling. And if these cliches don't put you off, the songs will. They just keep coming and replacing the actors who don't get a chance to tell the story or show emotions but the lyrics do that for them which is plain awful and lazy.

Won't be watching any more episodes, not even as background noise to pass the time. I won't be surprised if Degrassi Junior High is to be rebooted and put through the same horrible shallow rinse cycle. I'll just ignore that, like this series and stick to the original. As the saying goes, if it's not broken, don't fix it.

Watched it only for Pfeiffer and she didn't disappoint. What did was the way the three FLOTUS - Eleanor Roosevely, Betty Ford and Michelle Obama - had to compete for screen time.

What on earth did the director (Bier) had in mind when she flipped back and forth on the timeline of these women's lives. Like watching a time machine jumping here and there which disrupts the storyline and makes it hard to care for the characters. Even during the telling of any of the FLOTUS, there were flashbacks.

Anderson did a good job portraying her FLOTUS. But it could be seen as just an extension of her Thatcher role, the only difference being the fake teeth she had to wear. Pfeiffer was great as Ford, struggling with alcohol and medication addictions, she had the beefiest role. Then there is Davis' Obama and I'm shocked how badly she portrayed Michelle. The more I watched, the more I concluded that Davis must hate Michelle. Michelle does not have an overbite nor does she pout and curl her mouth like that. The makeup department has got her looking like a clown with her mismatching pencil thin eyebrows.

It would have been better to have three episodes per FLOTUS, not this mashed up time hopping mad presentation. Interesting lives and personal struggles of these women deserve more time, told in a well pace and meaningful way but Bier's direction has proven to be badly executed and standing in the way of engaging with the viewers.

There are some good themes - friendship, bullying, depression in this series that should have gotten more in depth story telling over the eight episodes. But the writers ruined the important substance by inserting mind-boggling slap stick humour here and there, some scenes lasting less than three minutes that had nothing to do with the previous. Tegan (Van Riel) and Meghan (Nguyen) are the two comedy relief providers who drinks, gets high and acts badly, really bad that they're irritating.

And they're not the only ones. All of these women are petty, vindictive and downright nasty that they make the children in Lord of the Flies look like saints. The biggest mean girl, Saskia (Stacey) reveals the reason she made the other girl's high school experience hell was because she had been groomed by a male teacher whom she'd mistaken was in love with her but had been grooming other students behind her back. An effigy of the teacher is made and burnt to symbolise the women overcoming the neverending misogyny making their life miserable.

This scene is not the only men-hating sideswipe the writers have included. But the irony is that in showing these women still holding grudges dating back a decade and in the absence of men in their apocalyptic world, how awful they treat each other is not the helpful feminist message they're planning to send out. The scene where Saskia and Genevieve (Lovering) at the prom, Genevieve suddenly seething at Saskia even though in an earlier moving episode, they had reconciled for past wrongdoings. Such pettiness or more like the uneven, terrible writing made the series hard to like.

The soundtrack is also annoying. Music thrown in one after another like it's MTV to emphasise scenes, even as background in touching moments of friendship. And if you survive that, there's the amount of swearing that supports the stereotype that Australians swear a lot.

Take it as a comedy, leave your brain at the door when watching this. That's the only way to survive this pocko series that tries too hard to all that's been done. They even borrowed the hilarious Bridesmaids bridal boutique scene just to get a few laughs.

4 stars for Browning, Smart, Stacey and Lawrence who at times must have felt ridiculous acting out the immature, self absorbed characters.

How befitting that Marilyn (de Armas) supposedly told DiMaggio (Cannavale) that the media tell lies about her to get publicity. This biopic by Andrew Dominik has certainly confirmed that. His artistic method from colour to B&W scenes, hand held shaky camera angle, distorting faces, intimate body or toilet POVs are jarring and served no purpose in telling the suffering of Marilyn Monroe at the hands of the people who used and abused her throughout her life and career. When she's not crying, she's screaming or naked or covered in blood in the nearly three hour movie. These scenes are lined up to shock that don't connect to one another and they aren't that good as an artitistic approach, more like a primary school project with indecisive subject matter and poor editing.

Marilyn Monroe deserves a biopic without the fancy effects or made up stories - the throuple with Chaplin Jr and Anderson; the abortion that never happened. She was one of the biggest star to grace the screens and just telling her interesting story without insensitive fabrication should be enough. Blonde is just disrespectful to Marilyn and Dominik is no better than the men who had used her for their own gain.

The one star is for de Armas who not only looked a lot like Marilyn but she must have had a hell of a time acting through the ADHD directions required of her. Blonde took three sittings to get through with a lot of head shaking in disbelief at the made up stuff and in your face shock treatment. Give me "My Week with Marilyn" any day that was handled beautifully and with a lot grace. Surely what Marilyn deserved after what she went through in her life.

Gorgeous looking film with an interesting idea but falls flat in the execution. Pugh carried the whole story while everyone just looked beautiful in the background. Styles really struggled what his role demands, more often he said his lines like he's reading them off a cereal box.

The story could have been explained a little bit more. Alice (Pugh) is an in demand surgeon pushing 30hr shifts while Jack (Styles) seem to be a layabout house husband who's unhappy with their married life so he injects them into a mind bending programme without Alice's knowledge. The programme takes them to a glamorous 1950's lifestyle where Jack is the breadwinner while Alice is the perfect housewife until she starts to feel something is not right.

Where more character development should have been the case in proper story telling, Wilde instead, opt for artsy clips here and there that will make your head spin. The overbearing soundtrack will also drive you up the wall with the shrill and bops of voices. Frank's (Pine) villainous character needed more development as well as his wife Shelley (Chan) especially when she said she was going to take over but the ending credit rolls soon after.

It's a lot of style and build up of tension but little substance follows. And borrowing from other movies like Clockwork Orange, Edward Scissorhands, Truman Show, Shutter Island, Westworld, Nope and any Korean mystery thriller that took Wilde's fancy. If Wilde had put more effort into explaining the why and how and cut back on the unnecessary bits, she could have pulled off a fine movie but as is, DWD is a mess. No wonder there was a lot of controversy generated for the movie which had alarm bells ringing because if a movie is good, it speaks for itself without the extra off screen drama.

There's nothing new here. Heavily borrowed Alive (1993) then the list runs long - Blair Witch Project, I Know What You Did Last Summer, Sixth Sense and whatever else. Also not new is the lecturing on sexism, patriarchy and racism. The worse bit is not even the back and forth flashbacks of two plotlines but the marital breakdown/affair, a murder, a blackmail, political ambitions, a disturbed child - if I haven't left anything out - are all thrown in there.

The three stars are for the storyline of the adults - Ricci, Lewis, Lynskey and Cypress who deserve more screen time. The younger actors are good but with the ridiculous loopholes in their part of storyline, they are out of their depth, struggling to make it believeable.

For one, how did the writers think a bunch of crash survivors could be stranded out in the wilderness for 19 months? Strange that there were no sounds of helicopter whirring around in the first week or so, especially given that Lottie's (Eaton) dad hired the private plane and also the plane was on fire, there would be smoke seen for miles. That's just crazy plot even for the sprawling Canadian Rockies, we're not talking the ocean here or a remote island in the South Pacific. But gore, sex and the scare factor are top priorities in this series. It could all be done very well but each episode is more convoluted than the previous one.

If the next season improves, it will be because the writers stop trying too hard to be edgy and stick to one or two storylines. They just have to remember that simple is good.

I was hooked in the first few episodes, especially the court room scenes where the meaning of consensual sex was scrutinised. But when the character 'Holly Berry' turned out to be the prosecutor Woodcroft (Dockery) who was assaulted by the accused James (Friend) in their Oxford days, it went downhill from there. It's laughable that someone can look so different, having grown taller, slimmer, has a different voice or that Sophie (Miller) couldn't recognise Woodcroft despite hanging out with her, used her to excel in Oxford but only realised it was her through her stationery toward the end.

It's incomprehensible that a lawyer would risk her career, go against professional oath to try to prosecute the man for his crime earlier against her. Then if that wasn't enough, on the night of the assault, another Oxford colleague died because he was given heroine by the future PM (Streatfeild) to add another twist to the storyline.

The theme is about white male privilege, they think they can do what they want, get away with it but there will be women who will bring them down. It's very suggestive in the closing scene where Woodcroft puts on her lawyer's gown and wig, staring straight ahead, then smiles, like Superwoman about to go out to bring bad white men to justice.

It tries too hard with the storyline, twists and the direction is bad. From spinning camera to the actors turning this way, suddenly falling down. It's all unnecessary and a big distraction. The story and acting should have been enough to make viewers interested from beginning to end.

I read great things about 1883 after abandoning Yellowstone Season 4 and sadly, Taylor Sheridan has used the same formula but applied it to a different era. Started out alright, then defies history, logic, facts and shows he still doesn't know how to write realistic female characters.

Elsa (May) narrates through the episodes, beginning with some flowery poetic observations after arriving into new frontier. Then she falls in love, loses him and becomes hysterical and murderous. But she snaps out of it after Captain Shea (Elliott) consoles her. During a tornado, she's befriended an Indian named Sam, so she rolls over him to give him a kiss, clearly a survival tactic that will help anyone through a deadly storm passing directly over them. Then her narration turns garbage where she questions gravity and scientists must all be wrong when she couldn't fall asleep under a cloudy night sky. Just like in Yellowstone, the female characters here are either on the edge or they are promiscuous.

Historically, the mass exodus to the west took place mid 1800's, so why is this series set in 1883 when surely, the railway network was quite sophisticated by then that anyone would still want to take the dangerous journey by wagons. Geographically, the states they were in or mention on their route to Oregon didn't follow any of the existing trails used by early pioneers. They seem to be going from Tennessee, head south to Texas before heading north. Wouldn't it be wise to travel in a straight line westward for these seasoned guides? The condescending treatment of the German and Romani pioneers like they're bunch of babies who are unable to adapt and learn is just disrespectful.

Just like Yellowstone, things happen or characters appear for no apparent reason. Taylor just loves cameos and he roped Tom Hanks, his wife Rita, Billy Bob Thornton and as I suspected, he himself showed up after a killing of horse thieves as cowboy named Charlie who mumbled his lines behind a very bad, fake beard. These appearances are a distraction as it just shows how well Taylor is connected that there are stars lining up to be in his series. Taylor has left a lot of the violence, gore and graphic sex behind in Yellowstone. But he's replaced it with touchy feely, emotional cowboys who tear up when they're talking about love and loss. That's the biggest error on top of all the other inaccuracies in 1883.

Watch it for the beautiful scenery if not for anything else worthy.

While I enjoy Yellowstone and currently watching Season 3, there is a constant irritant - the writers are clueless when it comes to the female characters. Take psychotic, suicidal Beth (Reilly) who's in a never ending downward spiral of bitterness toward those around her except her dad (Costner) and Rip (Hauser). If she's not drinking, she's dressing someone down or occassionally carrying out vandalism in a boutique.

Then there's miserable, moody Monica (Asbille) who is in a perpetual state of victimhood. If she's not lecturing about the suffering of Native Americans (past and present), she's moaning that her students are on social media too much. And on top of that, she's hates having to live at the Dutton's ranch even though it's better for her young son (Merrill) than at a Reservation. If the writers don't have her down in the dumps, she's required to do sex scenes or stripping off her clothes for a body search. Somebody please give her some happy pills.

Briefly, Governor Perry (Moniz) hardly has anything significant to contribute even though she's supposedly a powerful figure. Then there's the female journalist Sarah (Conlin) who gets snuffed out because of Jamie's secrets. Let's not forget also that matriach Evelyn Dutton (Mol) exited early on in season 1. There's the stripper who joined the handlers of the Dutton ranch - for whatever purpose, I'm not sure. And lastly, there's a blonde racist named Veronique (Dunbar) who went out of her way to frame Monica because she didn't like the look of her, for shoplifting and was ultimately humiliated by Beth.

So far, these women characters are all cliches, thin as the paper they're written on and are there to serve the political and social agendas of the writers. I read some reviews that this is the least woke series out at the moment but they're being sarcastic, right? Seems to me the positive ratings are for the cinematography, the sentimentalism for the lifestyle of cowboys and the struggle they deal with. That should be enough for many interesting storylines without the graphic violence, gore, political messages and degrading of female characters.

The writers/producers/directors ticked two very big boxes with this latest Bond movie. The first one was to win over protesters who sees Bond as a sexist and misogynist character. In No Time to Die, Bond is done with his womanising ways and only has eyes and heart for his one true love, Madeline (Seydoux). For a moment I thought I was watching a romance film, not a 007.

And when they temporarily gave 007 title to a woman of ethnic origin, it was purely for tokenism because Nomi (Lynch) has so little to do in her role. She struts around with a big chip on her shoulder, making sarcastic remarks to Bond about his ways with women. The scene where Nomi and Bond works together to take down the baddies is a farce. Since when has Bond ever needed a sidekick? Apparently in 2021, he does. The writers then tries not to disappoint hard cord fans further by making Nomi relinquish her 007 back to Bond. Phew! Saved that one.

And one more for the race craze before the writers get off is to make the mad Russian scientist (Dencik) say something racist to Nomi that she knocks him off. I knew it was coming before he opened his mouth when he was paired with her.

With a running time of 2hrs and 40 mins, I thought why is it so long? I found out that there was no reason except to deliver all the woke messages in a movie that is a skeleton version of the Bond franchise. Even the action sequence was predictable and safe. There was almost no one liners that Bond is famous for although Craig says more in No Time to Die but what he says comes out preachy, lovey-dovey and sounding more like a clown rather than someone who's a professional spy. I'm beginning to see Craig as a comedy actor rather than a dramatist.

Who will play Bond next? Does anyone really care after watching this mess when it's all about the causes rather than about the character. Amongst all the preachy stuff, what Safin (Malek) and even M (Fiennes) were saying about humanity, I was waiting for 'climate change' to be included. This is not fun escapism. It's a lecture and a long boring one at that.

While the old Bond movies cause debate about how women were depicted, they reflect an era gone by, where they didn't take themselves too seriously, was able to laugh at themselves and knew that telling a story about a spy with a licence to kill is just for thrills and entertainment. Time to lighten up and stop politicising everything.

It's part Desperate Housewives, Sex and the City and 50 Shades of Grey. I haven't read the book but this is really bad, it's like a comedy porn. First episode had me in stitches with the lazy writing, nonsense plotline, cringey cliches, dialogue and bad acting especially Demos. I have not see an actor as wooden and monotonous sounding as him for a long time. Is that why he bare all because that's all he has to offer?

All the characters are 2 dimensional. They do things that raise questions - Billie and Sasha are two psychologists but they behave like sexual delinquents with Billie's very unhealthy obsession with her ex, Brad. She's so unhinge even cognitive behaviour therapy would be useless for her, not that she'd know how bad her mental health is.

Billie and Sasha's friendship is so tight that not only does Billie not mind that Sasha is sleeping with Brad but watches them and 'participates' too.

The last few minutes of episode 8, sees Sasha delivering a message about white power and that power also suppressing women's needs. It somehow triggers Billie's lust that after watching her son's school production, she literally runs to her ex's apartment as a normal wife and mum would. She utters the most insane and crude things to him and the credit rolls.

Things happen for no apparent reason to connect all the animated sex scenes. Then the writer throws in a woke lecture just because it's 2021. This is just another porn show. Really rushed, badly created and amoral. The message it sends is that it's female empowerment to want and have it all. Even at the expense of hurting people close to you.

A movie based on a violent video game, what could go wrong? I had real hopes for this considering it has Hiroyuki Sanada as Scorpion in it. But his role is so limited, unfortunately the other less experienced actors had to make up for the the lack of substance in this movie.

The characters are cliche especially Kano, Australian actor Josh Lawson piles on the swearing, makes himself the crude and stupid bloke from Down Under. Then there is Lewis Tan's Cole Young who finally realises his true identity but he is so wooden throughout, it's hard to believe that he's the great one.

The storyline is non existent. For a start, Sub Zero kills Scorpion's wife and son by deep freezing them in the opening scenes. He then presumably does the same to Young's wife and daughter, but they only seem dead and Cole reinvigorates them from their frozen state, somehow.

The filming location is the one good thing good about this movie. But the plotless storyline helmed by an inexperience director and actors have let this movie down. The gory violence is also compensating for the lack of story. Fans will love seeing their MK characters come to life no doubt but it could have been done better, with no cliche needed.

I am breaking my rule of never reviewing a movie without finishing it but I just couldn't sit through this hot mess. When I heard that there was a new Terminator movie coming out, I was so excited especially with Cameron attached to it. I totally disregarded the other sequels, remake, reboot et al after T2.

T2 was an awesome sequel because of the complex human relationships and the clear and loud message of hope for the future. In T:DF, John Connor is killed by the T model that saved him in T2. What the?? Such a disrespectful way to show that this movie will be nothing like the originals but then to follow the very same formula except let's add in the 21st Century movements such as metoo and cultural representation.

Sarah Connor (played by magnificent Hamilton) was iconic and should have been enough. T:DF however needed to bring in a female cyborg (Davies) as well as a female protagonist (Reyes) and Connor. Once the CGI action started, it was all about that. Reyes was quite wooden for someone who had just lost two family members - one where she actually witnessed their demise and for someone who is destined to be an important leader, she wasn't really bothered to ask a tonne of questions.

It was too much for me to go any further, even for Arnold to show up. It wasn't just the feminism angle or the casting of ethnic actors with limited range that made it unbearable, it was the attempt at trying to retell a story that didn't need it all. I have no idea why Cameron wrote it as these days he's clearly more into deep sea diving and its technology development rather than movie making - perhaps he's lost it due to one too many dives.

I will eventually watch the whole thing but am not holding my breath. I may even surprise myself that my score might be even less than the two stars.

The title of this movie refers to Johannes Gutenberg who invented a printing press 500 years ago and hence it's about a gang of professional counterfeiters. The acting is solid from Kwok and Chow - two Hong Kong veteran actors with decades of experience - the former seemingly coming of age, finally. However the copycat Unusual Suspects plot just takes away what could have been a great film. And that's not the only movie it borrows from.

The cinematography is clean and modern. The operatic compositions and stylish songs make it feels like it's treading on Ocean's Eleven territory. Then the element of replacing a face through plastic surgery is pure rip off from John Woo's Face Off.

The plot apart from relying on past movies tries to absolve itself two-thirds past the running time of 130 minutes which consists of many flashbacks. The twists upon twists start coming of who the Painter really is. I already figured out who it is within ten minutes of the film because like Usual Suspects, the protaganist is hauled into the police station for interrogation. The many layers trying to distort and distract towards the end really feel cheap, you can almost hear the director crying out in desperation, "You didn't see that one coming. Or this one and this one." They just don't tie together the rest of the movie. Neither does the improbable shoot outs, explosions and finally, nor an added romantic scene with scantily clad actors round it all off nicely.

We've come to the age of film making where not much is original anymore. But perpetuating this current formula of reboot is not the way to go. It's just plain boring and lazy script writing and directing. Here's hoping that HK film industry reinvents itself again rather than pander to Hollywood with remakes.

I heard a lot about this movie without knowing who directed it. When the credits started to roll, I was surprised it was by Steve McQueen and Gillian Flynn. His 12 Years a Slave was an eye opener and guilt inducing. But Widows is nothing like his previous masterpiece. It is more an action, less drama with a little hint of comedy, a few twists thrown in and a lot of cliche kind of movie.

With Black Lives Matter, #Metoo and new wave of feminism in every form of media, it's on trend to make women the protagonists (Davis, Rodriguez, Debicki and Erivo - the latter is a bystander who got involved mainly for money) hence the title. The racism carried out by white men onto black people also plays an important theme as if McQueen couldn't decide which topic he wanted to focus on so let's mix them together in the narrative.

The African Americans aren't victims either - only the females are. The excellent Kaluuya morphs into Gary Oldman's Stansfield from Leon (1994). A violence loving thug who interrogates and tortures his victims - one being a disabled man who gets stabbed in his legs to see if he can feel the pain - to get what his politician brother (Henry) needs to win the upcoming election. I am sure his character is included just to please the horror loving fans.

With so many characters, Widows weaves in and out of flashbacks. The problem is the actors onscreen time are not only spliced up but the story is also rushed through. I refuse to believe that someone inexperienced, who has never held a gun before can plan and pull off a heist like these women in the space of a month. There are so many loopholes to the plot, it is laughable or as one reviewer wrote - plainly eye rolling stuff.

The acting is great although perhaps too much but let's leave Kaluuya have his fun. Davis is extraordinary, she can cry heavy tears without prompting. Debicki is the dumb naive blonde she has played before. Duvall is his usual grumpy old man self. I could go on but there are just too many.

Widows doesn't really hit the mark. The female heist plot has been done before and better in Ocean's 8. It just feels like another cookie cutter Hollywood production about racism, sexism and injustice amongst the lower class - all the rage at the moment. It also hastily does the cultural representation thing - Duvall's Asian live in nurse with only one spoken line if I remember correctly. What's the point? Because it's expected now.

And by following what is expected and what people are talking about, you get this mishmash convoluted movie that is doing its rounds like a viral post. McQueen needs to stop listening to what everyone expects and do a movie that entertains rather than educates.

A lot of comments that Bird Box is a copycat of A Quiet Place or The Happening. The Happening was written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan and released in 2008. However, Bird Box's first draft was written before The Happening came out. So it would be safe to assume that A Quiet Place's writers got their inspirations from the two stories.

Bird Box is the better film than A Quiet Place which I also like a lot. AQP apocalypse is caused by aliens so there is no mystery there, only how to beat them in order to survive. The acting by Blunt, Krasinki and the children are superb. It does eventually become an action film where the alien is blasted into bits and less drama towards the end of that film.

In Bird Box there are no actual aliens but the "creatures" that come in form of an invisible force with angry or sad voices. It remains unseen throughout the film and only one scene gives a clue as how it looks via rough sketches. This naturally creates a lot of questions which is clever in keeping the audience guessing. There are already loads of apocalyptical films out there that have all the big answers reveal and they are rather cliche.

Bird Box deals with a lot of psychological issues. From the obvious mass suicide to who to trust to loneliness of being a single parent. The story of Malorie's (Bullock) sad childhood to how she treats Boy (Edwards) and Girl (Blair) she's protecting but not allowing them to be children for a second. And the scene that made me sad is when in the boat, Malorie almost chooses Girl to be sacrificed until she remembers the promise she had made.

It's a very over saturated genre and I am glad that Bird Box didn't follow the same silly predictable action pack gore fest formula. The two films may be similar but I undoubtedly prefer Bird Box over A Quiet Place because it is not only showing gore and cheap scares but there are a lot of thought provoking and deep themes to think about.

I never got into the Harry Potter's stories. After reading the first three books, I gave up having no stomach for the repetitiveness and glaring mistakes in plotlines. I didn't bother to watch the third HP movie and beyond that either. So I decided to give Fantastic Beasts a go. The first movie was fun and enjoyable. I can't say the same for Crimes because it seems to distance itself from that movie to make its way back to Harry Potter.

At the half way mark, I became really bored and couldn't care less about the characters anymore. This is because the film is moving towards a climax which I already predicted will be in the fifth movie - the biggest duel between two wizards of all time. Until it gets there, this film is busy trying to explain where Credence played by Ezra Miller comes from as well as other characters' history that are already established in the Potter serie. The explanation of Credence's upbringing bizarrely involves the Lestrange family. Meanwhile the four main characters, Newt (Redmayne), Tina (Waterston), her sister Queenie (Sudol) and Jacob (Fogler) attempts to develop their love stories but with so much action and other subplots going on, they don't get a lot of chance time to do so.

Having written so many characters for Harry Potter and then trying to create a related wizardry world that took place decades prior was going to be complicated. I wiki some of the Crimes characters just to clear up the confusion. It seems the mistakes that put me off HP have appeared in this movie again. Rowling has either decided to change the timeline of events in HP or she's made glaring errors that she'd hoped no one will notice. For example, Crimes show briefly the young Professor McGonagall (Glascott) with a clear Dame Maggie Smith voice and tone. However in the Potter franchise, her birthday stated that she would have only been a child at the events of Grindelwald but here she is and confirmed by Rowling to be the very Minerva, an adult already teaching at Hogwarts.

The explanation and climax about who Credence actually is towards the end had me rolling my eyes in disbelief. There is no way Credence can be the brother to Dumbledore given Albus' complex family events. How Credence happen to be an infant on the boat bound for America and the massive age difference leaves a lot of questions. But since it is like a soapie there are more twists that are more than necessary and more will come no doubt. The likelihood is that Credence is probably the offspring between Dumbledore (Law) and Grindelwald (Depp) but in trying to draw out to the fifth movie, Rowling naturally had to make it more complicated. I will hate having to watch poor Credence be told that he's almost killed his father or mother in Dumbledore.

It's a common feature now to include actors from different culture because of the diversity representation movement. So you see a character that is Asian or African with mediocre contribution, one is left wondering if it's necessary to include them. Take Nagini (Kim) who apart from CGI scenes where she violently transforms into a giant snake doesn't do much else except frowns, breathes deeply and shouts ineffectively at Credence. Krall (Sakurai) has even less to offer. Being initially part of Grindelwald's gang sulking away, he eventually tries to kill him but ends up perishing in the dark lord's magic flames.

The whole Grindelwald uprising is clearly about the rise of Hitler's Third Reich. At the cemetery gathering, his followers can be heard saying, "Mein Fuhrer" as most of them appear in grey coats and knee high boots. Scenes in black and white of rolling tanks and cities in ruins leave little to the imagination. This is clearly indicating that there will be more epic battles between good and evil to come.

Crimes of Grindelwald is too hectic with nothing new to offer. The main actors are great but unfortunately the CGI has taken up a lot of screen time. A bad indication that a movie's plot and script are rather unimportant. Where Rowling tries to make it more interesting, there are plot holes and confusion instead. Thank goodness, the next film will be years away because the soap opera pace and more twists than ever have left me unimpressed.

CRA is so bad it is embarassing and I am Chinese. This movie shows the super rich Singaporeans going about their daily lives of buying multi million dollar jewellery or ordering their house keepers around to hide their purchases or jetting off to private islands or container ship for bachelorette or stag do. Inserted in between these rub it in your face wealth scenes are what appears to be tourism ads. I get it, Singapore is exotic and hyper modern and Singaporeans LOVE their food and so does the world, it's nothing new. When some of these Asian actors demand that they want to be represented in Hollywood, how about bringing something fresh to the table that will make people sit up and listen?

Instead the opening scene is the race card being played in such a cringeworthy bogus way that paves for an unbelievable plot right to the end. Another incredible bombshell is that Rachel, the fermale protagonist (Constance Wu) has no idea that her boyfriend Nick (Henry Golding) comes from a super rich and famous family. It's 2018, she's a cool professor - go feminism but she's has never googled his family - surely a take down on her intelligence. Wu is in superb form in her comedy sitcom but here, she's a stunned deer who gets shoved around.

Then there's how Singaporeans are depicted. The women are all preened and dripping with brand labels. When they are not eyeing the commoner Rachel up and down and gossiping, they are shopping or having crazy parties. I have never heard of Singaporeans partying away into the night and causing scenes. They are one of the most ultra conservative Asians on earth.

Further along, CRA has another go at western culture in the dumpling making scene. Chinese parents pass down traditions or values as well as recipes so their children will never resort to microwaving macaroni cheese and feel so much resentment towards their parents to ship them off to nursing homes. A lot of bashing the west but ironically this movie is like Sex and City with a lot of European luxurious brand names shown throughout it. And not to forget these crazy rich Asians also act like westerners and party hard like they're in Magaluf.

It's so sad to see the Chinese that already has an excellent film industry pander to Hollywood. Michelle Yeoh is South East Asia's screen legend even way before she ventured into the universally acclaimed Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. There are other notable Asians who have been given a platform in Hollywood - Jacky Chan, Gong Li, Ang Li, Lucy Liu. But it seems the complain still remains that Hollywood is whitewashing Asian stories. But if Crazy Rich Asians is what is on offer, I don't blame Hollywood for sourcing other talents. It's rather hypocritical that CRA has not represent the other minority groups in Singapore - the Indians and Malays.

It's 2018, people of all culture have so many opportunities than before so there's nothing really to complain about. That is if you are one of those people who expect to be rewarded just for turning up or just want to make a lot of money via Hollywood but use the cultural diversity cloak to get more attention.