krumblburgh

Jerry Seinfeld very nearly learned to act for UnFrosted, his first- possibly, maybe- live action major motion picture... on Netflix. Seinfeld is Bob Cabana, a visionary at a wholly fictional Kelloggs Cereal in the early 60s. When news arrives that arch-rival Post, fronted by cereal matriarch Amy Schumer, is developing a game-changer in the breakfast arena he is determined to get there first with the help of NASA marketing genius Melissa McCarthy. The result: Pop Tarts, and a made-up spot in fake history.

There's a lot of bad reviews of this show, and yet again an unnecessarily low IMDB score. C'mon, this ain't so bad, folks! There's a hundred jokes a minute being lobbed at the viewer, and a good third of them land with a solid laugh. The film is whimsical and silly, and uses its budget wisely on comic talent, mascot costumes and renting classy cars for Seinfeld to drive.

Unfrosted is fun and stupid, colourful and relentless, without any nutritional value whatsoever. It does exactly what it said it would on the box.

There are a number of reviews here apparently failing to understand this show. House of Ninjas is about a family with a long history serving as ninjas, protectors and assassins, but who have collectively retired. Some less willingly than others. It is light, frivolous and fun. The action sequences are sparse but exciting enough when they occur to propel the story further- they are not, however, the point of the series.

Folks complaining that House of Ninjas is not wall-to-wall fighting and killing, that the music is silly, that it is not like other ninja-themed shows or movies they have previously enjoyed, miss the point. The trick to reviewing is to watch a show and try to figure out what the creators are trying to do, and then decide if, in your opinion, they have succeeded in that. Otherwise, you will only enjoy the few things you already like and miss the joy of discovering other, different things.

Tarantino and James Gunn employ incongruent music in their films. The makers of House of Ninjas have done the same, with songs that have whatever meaning or effect for them. Rather than complain, perhaps I should wonder what those reasons are?

House of Ninjas is a solid action comedy series with excellent performances and gags. It is not going to redefine the genre, but it is not trying to. It is trying to entertain, and personally I felt it does that quite well.

How on Earth is this film currently rated 5.9? I'm giving it a ten in the hopes of averting the universe from tilting sideways with injustice. The writing is sharp, funny, often quietly potent. The cast is perfect and the cinematography, set and costume design excellent. Is the low rating because the film is anachronistic? Did some people think this was an historical reenactment? Obviously it's not because the casting is colour-blind, because that would be monumentally stupid. Bella Ramsey knocks every line, scowl, and flounce out of the park. A lovely little film, and here's hoping Bella Ramsey, already one of the very best actors of her generation, goes on to have a long, meandering and celebrated career.

I'm glad the review score for Kleo is steadily climbing. I gave it an 8, though I feel it's more of an early 7s, but I wanted to see it pick up from the 4.8 it started out as.

Kleo is an East German Stasi assassin in the late 1980s who gets 'burned' and sent to prison. When released, she goes on a revenge streak up the betrayal ladder. Some have called this show Villanelle-esque, but that isn't quite fair. There are similarities, but really, this show is about relationships in a particular time and place, rather than about a dysfunctional romance. It's fun, funny, well-paced, and full of oddball characters who are probably immediately recognisable to the folks who lived in this world.

My only real gripe about the show is the inconsistency of tone. There is whimsy and absurdity, which is a great way to address the political stupidity of the age. But sometimes the show will suddenly veer into magic realism and the impossible just because the makers want to keep the quirkiness factor pumping. Hi ho, it's their show, they can do what they like, but it seems to me to suggest lapses of confidence in the overall coolness and originality.

Star Trek has always been about discussing societal ills and addressing forms of oppression. This particular episode, "Watcher" covers environmental destruction, racism, emotional struggles- perhaps a bit bluntly, it tries to cover too many issues in too little time. That's not "woke", Star Trek has always discussed these things. Anyone who thinks these topics have no place in Star Trek has either never watched or cared about the show.

As a review, this episode is fine. It doesn't match the tension and danger of the first two episodes of this second season, but perhaps it's trying to set up later episodes. Splitting a 45 minute show into four storylines means each thread doesn't really have the time it needs to develop. But it's still better than some reviews here would have it scored.

I'm so tired of people complaining about wokeness because they don't want to have to bother caring about other, perhaps vulnerable people. Why would anyone who thinks that way watch Star Trek?

Around the World in 80 Days is a reworking of the original tale by Jules Verne, in which English gentleman Phileas Fogg, his charming but dubious valet Passepartout and an intrepid journalist named Abigail Fix attempt to circumnavigate the globe in just eighty days. The cast are excellent, the stories, beautifully shot in exotic locations, are little self-contained adventures touching on bits of science and history, adventure and developing characters. Despite what some reviews here might say, there is nothing "woke" about the series. One of the main characters is now a woman? Passepartout is black? This isn't "woke", it's just the 21st century. There's nothing wrong with original source materials being adapted and modernised. Jules Verne would accept progress and change as worthwhile.

Inspector Koo, or A Wonderful Sight is cleverly written and fairly stylish. The performances are all good-to-excellent, especially the leads. The best Korean comedy/drama? Perhaps not, but I have never seen a show have its imdb rating score swoop about so much!

At this time of writing, 88 out of 117 viewers rating it gave it a score of 7 or higher, with the largest group by far giving it a "10". Yet it now stands at 6.6, which might put future audiences from giving the show a try. Give it a try, anyway, I say.

There are claims it is trying to be a Korean version of Killing Eve. In a way, it's closer in feel to Sherlock. Not at that level of quality, but in the sense of it using graphics and structure to tell a story about a deeply flawed detective using almost superhuman skills to track a killer of near-supervillainous talent.

Inspector Koo is a fun play on manga comic books, and has some great comic moments. I would actually rate it a 7ish but felt there should be something countering its low score.

Squid Game is a brilliant metaphor for several things, but especially capitalism. 456 broken and bankrupt rats are set on a deadly race for a vast prize in an absurd and cartoonish version of hell. And who would willingly leave hell if there was even a chance, however outlandish, that staying might suddenly make them a billionaire? Very little of this series otherwise makes sense, and it makes an absolute meal of it.

There are similarities to shows like Battle Royale or Alice in Borderland, but Squid Game does a much better job of making characters believable and likeable. Even passing characters feel like actual people, so you care for the thirty seconds or so that you get to know them before they pass.

The design of the show is brilliant, the performances are all excellent. The danger feels real and the jokes are genuinely funny. I'm only on episode 2, but I love this show already. Personally, I like it better than Alice in Borderland.

EDIT: Just very quickly, a lot of reviews on here are mentioning the cringeworthy acting and dialogue of the VIPs. I agree, but I think there must be a reason for this. It seems unlikely that the same people who cast, wrote and directed all the other terrific performances suddenly lost the ability to cast, write for and direct non-Koreans. It seems more likely their relative cartoonishness had a specific meaning and purpose... even if we haven't figured out what it is, yet.

Sarah Cooper, popular on YouTube for her brilliant lip-sync interpretations of Donald Trump's flights of blather, has been given a Netflix special of her own. It's a hit and miss affair, though I enjoyed it more and more as the show went on. I feel it's being misrepresented. Yes, Cooper is a comedian. And yes, Everything's Fine is, technically, a comedy. But it's not really a comedy. Because everything is not fine. That's the point.

Just before you watch this, first do a little mind-flip: Imagine to yourself that what you are about to watch is actually a dystopian nightmare, an episode of Black Mirror with more jokes and immediate relevancy to current situations. Everything Is Fine is really Sarah Cooper screaming as she tumbles down the spiralling hell-hole of 2020 and landing at the stroke of New Years Eve, 2021, only to find it's going to be more of the same, regardless of whatever might result from the imminent election.

It's still funny. But terrifying. And the pacing is more confusing than useful to tie it all together. But, hey, that's modern life for you.

There are some reviews here- well, all of them, actually- which could be safely ignored. Some people seem to think Star Trek past was a warm blanket, its purpose being to comfort and console folks that the future is going to be a lovely chat on philosophical problems in a pastel coloured conference room. Star Trek has always dealt with the issues of the day, and not always in a sweet, harmless manner.

Star Trek: The Next Generation was made when America was at the height of its power and cosiness. The world today is a different place, and a Star Trek which does not reflect that is pointless. Star Trek: Picard takes place twenty years after the last film of that particular cast of characters. The Federation has taken a turn. Politics and human nature have soured. Further. Again. What a surprise. Conspiracies weave admittedly slightly overwrought threads. But Picard is on to them. Who he is now, how he got here and where he is destined to wind up have wandered very far from where we left him two decades ago and hundreds of years in the future. However, it should be pointed out, contrary to several hundred of these reviews, the means by which Picard hopes to right nefarious wrongs and confront the poison of fear, is by using optimism, openness, love and technology. So, the same Picard, essentially, as in the good old days.

This is not the Star Trek of sitting around on sofas saying, "And what do YOU think we should do?" Characters get their hands dirty, they get things wrong, they screw up, they try again to do better. They often fail.

This is not Star Trek: Next Generation. But give it a chance, and maybe it will be Star Trek: Your Generation.

There seem to be some reviews here panning this show for not being true sci-fi. It's not sci-fi, it was never sci-fi, it's social satire. A terrific cast working well together from scene one, although it is true there isn't a lot of warmth or likeable characters. Life has very few of those, either. A couple, maybe. I might know one of them. Not me, but I know one.

The target here is the incompetence of so-called leaders and their inane systems running society and how society seems just fine with that. In real life, people are apparently are not bothered when politicians and captains of industry without skills or knowledge or empathy or investment in the future of humanity send the world crashing sideways into oblivion. But in this show the public are immediately upset that their holiday has gone dangerously wrong. In this sense, Avenue 5 is taking an artistic liberty.

The writing is not as sharp as it could be. Time has been spent instead setting up a much more involved scenario than, say Veep or In The Thick Of It. All we need to know for those shows was that manipulative jerks run the show in London and Washington. For this, the creators are trying to set up a larger theme. Will it work, will it not, I don't know. But the bones are there for better things, and I trust the cast and writers to know where they are going. Based on their track record of past shows I trust them more than I trust us, the viewers.

A beautiful, cinematic, morally ambiguous and yet inclusive Star Trek for modern times. The cast are brilliant and the twists genuinely clever. I'm less happy about this iteration of the Klingons. Perhaps it's just me, but there seems to be a racial and cultural element to them that is unacceptable.

There are more than a few reviews here that declare this Star Trek to not be Star Trek. Apparently some folks believe a franchise must follow its cookie-cutter siblings to be considered a legitimate member of the family. There are complaints that it is dark, dystopian... these words repeat over and over. Star Trek is expected by many to be sunny, optimistic and utopian. Because they maybe feel science fiction requires at least one happy warm pocket a viewer can hide in, snuggled away from a troubled reality. In which case, those past series are still there for them to enjoy. This, however, is a Star Trek for the 21st century, in which moral and political certainties are questioned. If the traditional power structures of the real world today are being dramatically restructuring, it seems to me extraordinary that anyone should expect a child of Gene Roddenberry not to reflect that.

It is not the greatest show on television right now by a long shot. Is it better than a 7.4 rating on imdb? A star rating system, a point rating system, is the clunkiest way to assess anything. I've given this show eight, because I think you have to give some kind of rating for imdb to accept a review? But I've really enjoyed Discovery so far. I hope it continues and goes from strength to strength. I hope it at least addresses what I consider an unfortunate misstep.

By the way, should anyone think I'm being paid to write this, please let me assure you I am not. I was a theatre critic for fifteen years. I hope folks are willing to trust me when I say, nobody is getting rich off writing reviews on a website.