Change Your Image
stuartthomasart
Reviews
Star Trek: Discovery (2017)
Give it a chance, it's so much more than you'd expect
I can understand the vitriol Enterprise has received. Playing fast and loose with the continuity was always going to be controversial, as was the darker atmosphere. The thing is, that darkness is there for a reason- it's dealing with some very dark themes- betrayal, loss, death. And there's lots of all of those. But there is also, by the end of the series, that hope for the better tomorrow that is the DNA of Star Trek. Indeed, it is the one strand that holds together the entire story. A lot has been said about this series not being true to the ethos of Roddenberry's vision and, frankly, that's cobblers. This story gives new meaning to that vision, and that hope. Watch it. Enjoy it. Forget about the continuity issues and see just how this makes what will follow (or has gone before) have even bigger meaning. Oh, and the last 30 seconds of the last episode are pure magic that put a tear in my eye.
The Grand Tour (2016)
Good, but could be so much more.
I've watched the first four episodes and I'm not hugely impressed so far. I enjoy a bit of dicking about as much as the next man but they need to sort the balance out between the dicking about and, well, the "proper" bits before it becomes the shambling, over-indulgent mess that most of the last two seasons of Top Gear were. I guess I was expecting more from the title The Grand Tour. Themed shows based around the country they are based in, perhaps? More of an overall road trip around the world, discovering the automotive world as they went? Best road in each country? At the moment it just feels like they are doing a cover version of Top Gear and they could do so much more. I'll continue watching because, for all it's faults, it's still enjoyable but I'm hoping for improvement.
Camping (2016)
A good idea quickly turns bad
I had a long, proper review of this all written out but, in the end I couldn't be bothered. This is a terribly disappointing series. What starts out as a really promising comedy situation soon becomes a miserable drudge through a few days with the most deeply unpleasant human beings I've seen portrayed in some years. I was hoping for something like 'Detectorists'- gentle, British humour with a real-life undertone and some serious moments of real depth. Instead you get a bunch of vastly over-exaggerated caricatures, none of which you can feel any sympathy or goodwill towards. They are by turns selfish, pathetic, loveless, hopeless, arrogant, malevolent and nasty, never showing any real humanity towards one another. The only two you do feel anything for are the children who, if there's any justice, will spend the last episode casually murdering their adult relatives in their sleep. I'm not sure what Camping was trying to be because comedy it really is not. I suspect it's trying to be 'The Office' or 'Shameless', where characters are wittily observed and exaggerated for great effect but this slips wide of the mark if that's the case. There is no fun to be had here.
The Secret Life of Pets (2016)
Entertaining but hardly ground-breaking.
Watched The Secret Life of Pets last night. A story you could write on a postage stamp but with some genuine laugh out loud moments and some good voice characterisations. It didn't have any of the mawkish sentimentality that some cartoons manage to devolve into and the action barely let up throughout. Not one I'd want to keep (although there's a lot of background stuff going on that might warrant a second or third viewing) but certainly good for a rental. The animation, as you would expect, was superb with the city backgrounds looking stunning and the characters having great expression and movement. One thing does niggle at me though. It was obvious that the screenplay was thrown together using the "draw elements from the hat" method and, while they certainly lead to a few laughs, there were a few points that didn't quite gel with the internal logic of the film. I know it's just a cartoon but still, these things jar and it smacks of lazy writing. What these cartoons do really well, though, is slapstick and there's some great moments of that in this. To sum up: Great for the kids and with a few nice touches for adults to enjoy but not a great deal of substance.