I've watched some stuff over the past few weeks...

Watched quite a number of flicks and TV series over the past couple of weeks. The fam and I also finally gathered some courage to go into the cinemas once again amidst the current Covid-19 variants outbreak (although none were locally detected). So all in all it has been quite a ride for me and the fam in the screen pop culture department to close out the year.

So let's see what I've/we've been feasting our eyes with....


1. No Time To Die


I'll be the first to admit that I was one of the skeptics when I came to know about Daniel Craig's role as James Bond. Skyfall was the one that changed it all for me although many would attest that Casino Royale was the quintessential Daniel Craig Bond movie. No Time To Die was the perfect ending to Craig's tenure. Glad they chose to go down the 'ultimate sacrifice' route because no other Bond movie dared to do so. I later found out (mere minutes after finished watching the film) that Craig's Bond character was a 'variant' (set in a rebooted universe) rather than a continuation from the Connery-Lazenby-Moore-Dalton-Brosnan version of 007. It simple means that his death in NTTD would not stop future James Bond films from being made.


2. Dune


I vaguely remember the original 90s version of the film except that Sting was in it (the musician, NOT the wrestler!). I also remember the original film not having smashing special effects but it was totally understandable for a 90s flick at the time. Once I've watched this 2021 version of Dune, my faded memories of that 90s film quickly dissipated into the unknown parts of my brain. The CGI was top notch albeit not overly done and the choices of actors were great. I especially enjoyed Jason Momoa's Duncan Idaho character though I was sorry to see him die halfway into the movie. Can't wait to see how the good guys ride the sandworms next in the sequel.


3. Ghostbusters: Afterlife


I must've replayed both my Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters:2 video tapes to death back in the day. Yeah I'm a bit of a fan myself of the franchise having owned most of the action figures and all in my heyday so of course I was looking forward to Afterlife. For the record my family and I quite enjoyed Paul Feig's 2016 flick despite the barrage of criticisms thrown at it. But I digress. Let's talk about Afterlife. What's not to like about the film, we wanted the nostalgia and we got just that. We did have to wait a good hour or so before we had a glimpse of one OG member of the legendary quartet. Some say that Afterlife is like what The Force Awakens was to the Star Wars franchise, but I disagree. It's the perfect continuation from where Ivan Reitman left us off back in '89 and I believe there will be more based on the post-credit scenes we've seen.


4. Netflix's Red Notice

What's the use of a binge-watching period without hitting Netflix or Disney Plus for your fix, right? There was so much hype surrounding Red Notice but I kind of expected it to be that cliche Dwayne Johnson-Ryan Reynolds type of action-comedy flick....and it indeed was. Plot was ok and the acting was typically expected of the set of actors. But comedy is comedy so you might want to watch this popcorn flick with an open mind and not that great of an expectation.


5. Shang-Chi And The Legend of the Ten Rings


Shang-Chi was surprisingly good in my books! I didn't expect much but it was an enjoyable ride throughout. I have to praise Marvel Studios for giving us yet another B-character film. It reminded me of how they were very successful with their Guardians of the Galaxy franchise. Sometimes a great story telling is all you need to push obscure characters to the forefront and Shang-Chi is just that. I loved how they used the legendary Tony Leung in the film, it just adds to the whole mystical oriental feel to the film. And don't let me start with Wong's cameo in the film. Oh, and did you notice The Abomination during the underground fight scene? 


6. Spider-Man: No Way Home


Let's face it, we've been ruthlessly bombarded by a year's worth of countless promo materials leading up to the film's release last week. We've been wanting to really watch this with every second of teaser materials shoved onto our faces since the first trailer. Is it really safe to talk about spoilers at this point of time? Of course it is. Or else why would you even be here in the first place. I believed many man-tears were shed at the sight of the 3 Spider-men together on screen. That inevitably meant that Tobey McGuire's 2002 film was the first MCU film and not 2008's Iron Man although many would argue that Sony made the '02 film but let's not get too technical with that. I loved NWH and I believe that this is by far THE best live-action Spidey film to date. I'll probably watch it again at the cinemas at some point and buy the blu-ray when it comes out. It's that good.


7. Venom: Let There Be Carnage


Venom 2 (let's just call it that, it's easy on the tongue!) was typically a continuation of the first Tom Hardy-led film...same acting style, same ambience, same feel etc. If not for Woody Harrelson's acting then I would've forgotten many-a-times that I was watching the second film of Hardy's Venom franchise. Having said that I enjoyed the effort put in to include Shriek and the possible introduction of Toxin at the end of the film. The post-credit scene tied the titular character to the MCU (and this had been reciprocally acknowledged in the Spider-man: No Way Home first post-credit scene) and it looks like parts of Hardy's Venom symbiote will be the catalyst for yet another symbiote to appear in the MCU, even if Tom Hardy himself won't be in it.


8. Netflix's Master of the Universe : Revelation Part 2


It took me a while to finally watch this as I was at the time still reeling from that shock ending from Part 1. Many unkind words had been thrown and said about Kevin Smith and his unpopular direction for the 'Revelation series but I like them. Just like I like Rian Johnson's plot for The Last Jedi. It may not please most but it sure gave the franchise a solid kick in the rear. The ending of Part 1 meant that He-Man/Prince Adam was slaughtered twice in one season (though it didn't end in dying the second time around) but he got his just revenge in Part 2. Loved the direction they took with Evil-Lyn and that shock teaser for the Horde to make an appearance at the very end.


9. The Office: Seasons 1 - 9


Ok, this re-watching of the original 'reality TV show' actually took me approximately 3 weeks to finish. I was immediately transported back to a magical time when the likes of Michael Scott, Dwight Schrute and Kevin Malone gave us their brand of silly awkward comedy. I have to admit that I struggled to finish Seasons 8 - 9 because without Michael Scott it was just different although the Nard-Dog and Dwight did their very best to carry us through those couple of seasons. The Office (US version) remains one of my favorite TV comedy show ever alongside Seinfeld and The Big Bang Theory. It deserves endless re-watch in the future. Endless long pure pleasure. That's what she said.


10. The Beatles: Get Back documentaries


To the common man, going through a 8-hour documentary series is pure torture but to us Beatles-enthusiast, a mere 8 hour trip is not remotely enough to satisfy our thirst to see how the Fab Four conjure up materials for their Let It Be album. As a songwriter myself it was an interesting look at how they came up with their hits for the Let It Be, Abbey Road and even for their respective solo albums. Astonishingly, McCartney wrote Get Back while waiting for Lennon to arrive at Twickenham. Pretty distressing to see Harrison walking out of the session but thank the maker soon after, the rest of The Beatles managed to coax him to come back. Billy Preston's presence really added the much needed fire to produce the magical Let It Be album too.
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Astonishingly, I still haven't watched Eternals at the point of writing this and I still do not have the drive to watch it anytime soon. I can't fathom this since I'm a huge fan of the graphic novel. I'll probably wait for it to appear on Disney Plus though. Weird enough, I am more intrigued to slip in a couple of other titles to the already astounding number of movies/TV series I've watched thus far in the past several weeks to round up the month/year namely Spencer, Being The Ricardos and Netflix's Season 2 of The Witcher.

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