adam-phillips-817-745584 Reviews

Echo 3 (2022–2023)

Slow and Silly

[5/10 · 1 February 2023]

I wanted to like this series, capable actors, reasonable plot, some very nice camera work and shooting on location, I imagine it cost a fortune to make.

The pacing is terrible, so slow much of it is just boring.

The action sequences are very limited, lots of briefings, getting on to helicopters and walking through jungle not much engaging. If there was a competent military plan involved at any point I missed it.

There are a lot of extras and minor characters, but only a small number of roles that actually matter. In typical apple fashion the female leads are all brilliant, decisive and heroic, the male leads are all muscular idiots.

It felt like very familiar material given a slightly more arty treatment, ultimately falling well short of films like Clear and Present Danger or Proof of Life.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

Strangely unsatisfying

[5/10 · 2 July 2022]

I was never much of a comic book fan growing up and was initially quite dismissive of Marvels Comic Universe, but came to develop a grudging admiration for the various Iron Man, Captain America and Avengers films.

These earlier MCU films elevated their stories beyond their childish comic book origins, took full advantage of CGI to weave an all together richer, more complex and highly engaging grand tapestry that was equally enjoyable to old and young alike.

This film feels much smaller, more comic book, aimed at young audiences and leaves a slightly unpleasant feminist activist after taste that seems to characterize all of Disney's recent offerings.

Ultimately a bit pointless, a nit boring, when they had all the ingredients for something special.

S.W.A.T. (2017– )

Utterly Dismal

[2/10 · 9 February 2022]

Perhaps, the most formulaic, most predictable, most stereotypical TV series I have ever watched. Compounded by the dismally wooden acting, absolutely awful.

L.A.'s Finest (2019–2020)

Flat Out Failure

[2/10 · 11 January 2022]

Whatever slight charm the Bad Boys movies may have held has comprehensively failed to transfer to this gender swapping TV series. Just a series of silly, unbelievable, unamusing situations starring the ill suited heroines.

Jessica Alba's worst work.

Lucky I gave it a 2.

Foundation (2021– )

Slow and Dull

[5/10 · 22 October 2021]

Visually quite impressive but sadly lacking otherwise. I read the books in the 80's so the details are not fresh in my mind but the 5 episodes I have watched so far seem only slightly connected to the original story.

Predictably the galaxy is ruled by white men while the oppressed masses are heroically lead by black women. Asians and other races seem not to exist.

Pacing is very slow, dialogue is stilted, acting is only adequate.

Episode 5 was just outright boring.

I'll keep watching but I'm not expecting much, all things considered a disappointing adaptation.

SAS: Red Notice (2021)

Ludicrous

[3/10 · 3 May 2021]

Mediocre plot, awful acting, and the apallingly untalented Ruby Rose made this utterly forgetable.

Debris (2021)

Underwhelming

[5/10 · 1 May 2021]

The series has an interesting premise which would probably make a great novel but somehow just doesn't deliver on screen. I suspect the main issue is the practical difficulties of making a TV series during covid.

Virtually every scene is set in a remote, unpopulated location, the incidents they respond to seem to involve at most two civilians, the combined CIA/MI6 international team has around 10 staff, that can only congregate in groups of 4 or less and the mysterious rival organization has perhaps 6 members.

Similarly despite the the bits of debris having capabilities that potentially rewrite human understanding of the physical universe the incidents themselves are so mild that if they had gone uninvestigated you suspect they would have gone completely unnoticed.

All up very disappointing, hardly any people, in remote locations, where hardly anything happens.

For All Mankind (2019– )

For All Womankind

[5/10 · 28 February 2021]

It started quite well but soon degenerated into a dull soap opera about the everyday lives of the large number of mostly fictional female characters involved in America's space program. Possibly something space flight related will happen later in the series but it certainly hasn't happened by episode 5.

Black Panther (2018)

Dull and Formulaic

[3/10 · 16 December 2020]

Groaning under the weight of it's own political correctness, this colour by numbers adaptation manages only to be utterly predictable and lacking in charm.

Avengers: Infinity War (2018)

The end but probably not the end

[6/10 · 4 August 2018]

This is a big movie, a really big movie. Pretty much every Marvel character in the universe pulled in to a giant, drawn out fight for the fate of the universe. The production values are of course excellent but somehow I just felt it was a bit overwhelming, another fight, another explosion, another Marvel character, by the time it finally finished I was a bit beyond caring. It would have made a clever final chapter for the avengers but suprise, suprise I see there is another Avengers movie coming next year so I guess it is really just another super-hero movie.

Annihilation (I) (2018)

Where to Begin?

[8/10 · 4 June 2018]

I watched this film with very low expectations, knowing only that it had an all female cast. I had assumed it would be cut from the same cloth as Black Panther or the recent Ghost Busters remake where the only point of the film is that it does not have white male cast. How wrong I was.

I can see why so many of the reviewers seemed to have loathed it but I loved it. A most unexpected treat that defies conventional explanation and offers no real understanding.

An excellent soundtrack, visually quite lovely, it ranges from tediously dull to tensely suspenseful with moments of amazement and horror.

A dash of 2001, a hint of The Arrival, a flicker of Aliens, something altogether different.