Blind Rage

Posted by cat2002116 on August 14, 2024
Posted in: Apocalyptic, Books, Horror, Reviews. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I’ll preface this review by saying that I don’t read or watch a lot of fiction involving zombies. You’ll know, from my reviews, that I really like horror fiction. However, I like my horror to actually have the chance of characters surviving…even if that doesn’t happen the majority of the time.

This book isn’t exactly about zombies, although the people who lose their minds after looking up at the sky certainly share characteristics with zombies. After all, they’re overtaken by rage that makes them unable to see anything else; literally, as they’re turned blind. This phenomenon doesn’t actually strike everyone in the world…although it’s not actually clear whether some people don’t turn just because they don’t look up at the sky, or if they too are immune. Some of those people who didn’t look up at the sky and didn’t turn at the start of the book actually end up looking at the sky later on…and end up turning.

I don’t think I can blame the people who look up at the sky, to be perfectly honest. After all, if I saw a whole lot of people stopping and looking up at the sky, I’d probably do the exact same thing. In that respect, I think the author did a really good job of capturing that sense of curiosity that a lot of people have. If something’s happening, a lot of people are going to look.

There are a lot of tense scenes in this first book, especially after the initial crack in the sky appears. By that point, everyone knows that something is causing people to lose their minds and turn on everyone else around them…and most of them are waiting for the next incident to occur. The countdown to when, especially from the perspective of those who get early warning signals (the loss of hearing and the sensation that someone’s watching them) was enough to keep me on the edge of my seat.

I do feel there could have been less POV characters in this book, as the constant switching didn’t leave me with enough time to connect emotionally with many of those characters who only appeared for a chapter or two. I did care a lot about what was happening to Gina, Mark and Tommy, though, as they were the ones I got to know the most over the course of the book.

By the end of this book, I was left with a lot more questions than answers. And, of course, it ended on something of a cliffhanger. I am intrigued enough to read the next books in the series at some point in the future, though, as I’m keen to get the answers to some of my questions.

Trap

Posted by cat2002116 on August 14, 2024
Posted in: Horror, Movies, Reviews. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment


This was a movie that I kept seeing trailers for; not on purpose, but because it kept coming up when I was watching YouTube videos, or when I went to the cinema.

Sadly, while I really did want to see this film, this was definitely a case of the trailer giving away too much of the movie’s plot. I did enjoy watching the movie, especially with my oldest nibling, but I felt that there weren’t any real surprises, as the trailer had made it clear who Cooper actually was.

There was a lot of tension in this movie, and I did enjoy seeing how Cooper was outwitting those who were there to try and apprehend him. Josh Hartnett did a really good job portraying Cooper, and the steady decline in his mental state as the movie went on. To begin with, it was hard to reconcile the loving father at the start of the movie with the idea that he was likely a serial killer…but it became more and more believable that he was as the movie progressed.

I really liked Riley as a character, and not just because she bore more than a passing resemblance to my oldest nibling. Being a fan of events like conventions, I was really able to relate to her enthusiasm at seeing Lady Raven on stage, and how excited she was to be able to see her. I also loved the scene where everyone puts on the flashlight apps on their phones. That scene was visually a really good one.

I was a bit surprised by how big a role Lady Raven actually ended up playing in the movie. To begin with, it seemed like she was just going to be seen from afar…but as the movie went on and she became more and more involved in the plot, I found myself liking her more and more. She might have been scared at various points, but she also came across as very brave in a way that was more realistic than I’m really used to seeing in a lot of horror movies.

I liked Jamie as a character in the movie, though I cringed at how much he gave away to Cooper. I know Cooper gave off a family guy vibe (helped along by the presence of his daughter) and revealed he was a fireman…but come on, Jamie! Don’t just go giving your security code to the charming stranger you’ve only just met. Considering I have to deal with a lot of confidential things, his blase attitude made me cringe.

I also couldn’t really understand why Cooper shoved a young girl down some stairs, since that did nothing to get him out of the building and he surely didn’t think the distraction would be enough to escape? Perhaps an argument could be made that he was beginning to grow desperate, but given how calculated he was to start, that didn’t really seem to fit his character.

There were a lot of good things about this movie. I might have liked to see an actual twist, but I still liked watching this movie. And, of course, I really liked seeing M. Night Shymalan’s cameo, which I told my nibling we should look out for.

I would definitely say this movie is worth seeing, even if I was a bit disappointed that there was no real twist.

Gallows Born

Posted by cat2002116 on August 14, 2024
Posted in: Books, Fantasy, Reviews, Young Adult. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

This book was one that came up on my Facebook feed when I was browsing through. The blurb was intriguing, even though the plot wasn’t hugely original, so I decided to give it a try.

The opening scene of the book was pretty tense, with a young woman being accused of stealing from the castle and about to be executed for it. Right from the start, it’s obvious that there’s a lot more to the execution than the so-called crime Nel committed. This is partly due to Gelwin’s protestations of her sister’s innocence…and partly due to the fact that Nel, upon being executed, gives birth to a little boy, which is, of course, where the title of the book comes from.

Bane’s life in Crookfell is fairly typical of a main character in a fantasy book. He’s an outcast, with a dead mother and a dead guardian…his only living guardian is physically and verbally abusive…and everyone in the town hates him. He also has a special marking, or tattoo, on his arm that marks him in some way and is later important to the plot.

Despite the large amount of cliches, I found Bane to be a character who was easy to empathise with. I also really appreciated that, while there are some elements of ‘you can fight so well because it’s in your genes’, he’s actually trained to fight and it’s in a way that makes sense, in spite of being used as a literal punching bag during one of his (many) bullies’ own attempts at training.

I really wasn’t a fan of the romance that seemed shoehorned into this book. Belle seemed to follow the whole Cinderella trope, but I didn’t find her to be an interesting character. I knew barely anything about her, apart from what Bane so, so she didn’t feel ‘real’ to me. On the other hand, Alruna had more depth to her…but I’m really not a fan of the whole enemies to lovers trope, especially as the whole reason Alruna hates Bane is because he killed her brother to save his own life. I have a serious problem with people who want others to suffer/die when their only ‘crime’ was defending themselves…and, in Bane’s case, the rest of his town.

The idea of the Fug was quite an intriguing one, especially with how it related to Vikings and Norse mythology. I liked the fact that it wasn’t all revealed at once, instead being shown gradually as the book went along.

On the whole, I did find this book easy to read…but Bane was the only character I really felt any real connection to. I did like Gelwin, but as she only appeared at the start of the book, I didn’t really form a connection with her. If you like fantasy that’s easy to read and fairly engaging, this book is probably worth reading. At some point in the future, I’d probably be interested in reading the next books in this series.

Five Survive

Posted by cat2002116 on August 8, 2024
Posted in: Books, Reviews, Thriller, Young Adult. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I originally started reading this book several months ago, but thanks to how bad one of the main characters was, I ended up putting it down until my oldest nibling told me they’d read it faster than the previous standalone book by Holly Jackson. So then I picked it up again…and finished reading it in less than a day.

I found Red to be a character who was really easy to empathise with and understand. I actually liked most of the characters who were trapped in the RV; except for Oliver, who didn’t seem to have a single redeeming quality to him. I was actually a bit disappointed, given how well developed the other characters were.

I thought Holly Jackson did a really good job of showing the tension and claustraphobia as the six main characters became trapped in the RV by a sniper. I do think that going along with every one of Oliver’s plans was a mistake, especially as he became more and more unhinged as time went on. At the same time, though, I guess no one else tried to step in, so maybe it was understandable.

I really liked seeing Red’s interactions with Arthur, as I thought they were very cute together. I really liked how Arthur bonded with Red by writing his own messages on his hand…and I liked that he constantly checked in with her, as it seemed like none of the others were really doing that; even Maddy, who was supposed to be Red’s best friend.

I do think that the group could have looked at what secret one of them held long before they actually did. Yes, the group was focusing on trying to escape…and assumed the secret was linked to the case being handled by Maddy and Oliver’s mother. However, as soon as it became clear that it wasn’t about Oliver or Maddy, it surprises me that no one thought to start asking about secrets.

I did find myself caring about all of the characters; except for Oliver, really. Yes, all of them had secrets of their own…some connected to the current situation they found themselves in and others that had nothing to do with why the sniper was targeting them. I thought the way those secrets came out were very seamless, and some of them made for very good red herrings. And the ending did manage to surprise me a bit.

All in all, I did really enjoy reading this book. It was quick and easy, and I’m glad I gave it a second chance. If you enjoyed A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, I would recommend giving this book a try too.

Stay Awake

Posted by cat2002116 on August 6, 2024
Posted in: Books, Mystery, Reviews, Thriller. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

I actually heard about this book when I watched a YouTube video about horror/scary books that should be made into TV series. The explanation of the plot sounded so intriguing, I was immediately interested and looked up the book on Amazon Kindle. It wasn’t very expensive, so I bought it…and then the YouTuber commented that the book wasn’t all that great, in spite of the interesting premise.

Since books (and movies, TV series, video games, etc.) can be subjective, I decided to give this book a try anyway, and I did find it a really quick, easy read. I will say, however, that it did hit a couple of my dislikes when it comes to books. For instance, there was a huge amount of info dumping in Detective Halliday’s sections of the book…and the book also kept switching between first and third person and present and past tense, which unfortunately made the book a little confusing and hard to follow at times.

A lot of this book made me think of the movie Memento, which this book had a very similar premise to. I did find Liv to be a character who was really easy to relate to and empathise with. Right from the very first scene, when she’s in the cab going back to what she thinks is her apartment, I was able to feel her confusion and disorientation about what was going on. It was clear that she didn’t have any memory of what had happened and why she had a bloodstained knife in her hand, and I could definitely empathise with her confusion and fear as the news reports start talking about the murder scene with the words Stay Awake written in blood at the scene; the same words that Liv has written on her own skin, because every time she falls asleep, her memory resets.

I will say that the constant flashbacks to two years ago made it really hard for me to follow the exact timeline in the present day. Later on in the book, it’s heavily implied that the entire murder investigation took place in a day…and I’m sorry, but that just didn’t feel realistic to me. I know, I know. It’s a book about a person whose memory resets every time she goes to sleep; it’s not exactly realistic. But suspending my disbelief about that was vastly different to suspending my disbelief about two detectives doing so much in less than 24 hours.

While I did find the constant flashbacks to be quite confusing, it was good to learn about what had happened to Liv gradually, as she herself learned about what had happened two years ago. However, I do think there could have been a different, better way of gradually revealing that information, since the constant changes in tense and voice made it difficult to switch focus.

Despite the problems, I did actually enjoy reading this book. It had a really interesting premise, and the main character was someone I really cared about and empathised with. I would be interested in reading more books by this same author in the future, so long as just one style is used when writing!

Spirited Away

Posted by cat2002116 on August 5, 2024
Posted in: Fantasy, Plays, Reviews. Tagged: , , . Leave a comment

I’ll preface this review by saying that the animated movie of Spirited Away is one of my favourite movies of all times. I’d say that it’s one of my sister’s favourite movies, too. So when she offered to pay for tickets to the theatre showing in London this year, for my birthday, I immediately jumped at the chance.

I seriously loved the show, and I’m so happy that I got to experience seeing it with my sister. I will say that being in the balcony did give a bit of a restricted view, as the balcony itself blocked a small portion of the stage. Unfortunately, part of the story did take place in an area that was blocked from view, so if you go to see the play, I would suggest avoiding the balcony seating.

Spirited Away the movie is an animated movie, and I was really interested to see how that carried through onto the stage. I thought the animated parts worked really well…and I especially liked seeing Yubaba’s giant head and how that was created on the stage.

I really loved the visual aspects of the play. The opening scene played out at the very front of the stage, which unfortunately did mean I missed a few moments of Chihiro and her parents. It had been a while since I saw the animated movie, so while I remembered most of the basic storyline, I couldn’t remember all of the intricate details. However, after Chihiro and her parents went through the tunnel, the whole stage opened up…and I felt like I was getting a glimpse into a much bigger world. There was a lot of space on the stage, and the cast definitely made use of it.

The costumes and look of the characters fit so well with what I remembered from the original movie, which was really awesome. I loved Lin especially, as she looked and sounded so much like her counterpart from the movie…and Lin was always one of my favourites from the movie, along with Chihiro and Haku, of course.

Speaking of Chihiro and Haku, I thought the play did a really good job of showing the friendship and relationship between them. Since that was one of the strongest elements of the original movie, it was really important to me that that come across well in the theatre show…and I really felt it did.

Another aspect that I truly liked about this show was the music. The song about the gods going into the bathhouse right at the start was really good…and I particularly liked the song and dance when the gold is scattered in the bathhouse the first time; although to be honest, I was confused and thought they were golden fans at first!

The show was actually subtitled, which is something I’ve never experienced at a theatre show before. It wasn’t entirely easy to read the subtitles and watch what was going on at the same time. However, the screens showing the subtitles were very clear; they were just set quite far above the stage, so I was trying to read the subtitles as fast as possible and then watch was going on on the stage. I’m a fast reader, but I did find it difficult to take in both at times.

Despite the issues with the restricted view, I did really enjoy this show and I found it a really good retelling of one of my favourite movies. I would definitely recommend watching this show, especially if you’re a fan of Japanese animated movies.

Artificial Wisdom

Posted by cat2002116 on August 3, 2024
Posted in: Books, End of The World Book Reading Club, Reviews, Science Fiction. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

This was another book I received through the End of the World Reading Club…and I was immediately intrigued by the cover and the blurb. Given the content of the book, it felt like it fit very well with the current affairs of the world.

Given I was reading this book during the summer, when it was quite hot, the heatwave in the book that killed millions felt like it could really happen.

Tully was a character who I was quickly able to empathise with, given how he was suffering from the loss of his wife and unborn child…and had had no chance of finding her body, until the mysterious whistleblower who reached out with footage from the tabkhir that had devastated the Persian Gulf.

While I was able to empathise with Tully really well, and gradually learned about Livia, I have to say that Lottie and Randall weren’t really developed to the extent that other characters were.

I thought that the whole murder mystery part of this book worked really well. It was really good to follow along in the investigation with Tully and October…but I have to say, I really didn’t like October as a character. I know she and everyone else said that the Floating States had different laws, but from an ethical standpoint, I felt that a lot of her actions were very questionable.

One of the things I really liked about this book was the description of the technology used in the world. While it was clearly futuristic, it felt like the technology was close to the kind of technology that exists now.

I liked the whole backdrop of the election, with the human running against the AI. I found Solomon a little bland as a character, to be honest. I guess that made sense, considering the fact he was an AI, but I would have liked a bit more about him…especially his relationship with Martha, who was effectively his mother, as she was the one who created him.

I mentioned that the murder mystery aspect of the book was really good, and I was really engaged with it…until the end of the book. I thought things made sense…and then it was like the rug was pulled out from under me with a random, ‘No, it wasn’t this at all!’ Without going into too much detail…I felt the ending was pretty meh.

On the whole, the book was easy to read. The main characters were engaging and well-written, even if some of the secondary characters felt a bit flat. And I definitely felt that the ending didn’t need an extra ‘twist’. But I am glad I was able to read this book, and while it isn’t something I’d read again, it was definitely intriguing for an initial read-through.

Deadpool and Wolverine

Posted by cat2002116 on August 3, 2024
Posted in: Marvel, Movies, Reviews, Superhero. Tagged: , , , . Leave a comment

So, let’s be honest. Deadpool and Wolverine? Yeah, I was always going to go and see it. I love Marvel…and my love of Marvel started out with the X-Men movies. And Deadpool 1 and 2 were just so good. Even after his original failed debut in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Ryan Reynolds actually is Deadpool. I couldn’t imagine any other actor being able to portray him nearly as well.

Sometimes, the very first scene of a movie will make me realise instantly whether I’ll like it or not. The opening scene of this movie? Had me nearly crying with laughter. Who else but Deadpool would try to dig up Logan’s body, and then use the bones from his skeleton in a battle montage…while dancing to the opening song?

I actually had very little idea of what to expect from this movie, apart from it being the long-awaited teamup between Deadpool and Wolverine. I did watch the first season of Loki, so I was familiar with both the TVA and the Void…but I don’t think you need to have watched the MCU to understand what was going on. (My sister isn’t a fan of most superhero movies, but she always enjoyed X-Men and Deadpool…and also really liked this).

I can’t say that I’m all that familiar with the comic universe, so although I appreciated the huge army of Deadpools who appeared at the end…I didn’t know much about any of them. I did love how classic!Deadpool commented on how ridiculous the multiverse was getting, because by the time that scene rolled around, I was finding it a bit tiresome. But I loved Dogpool (Mary Poppins) and I liked Nicepool, even though he had none of the attitude that makes classic!Deadpool so interesting.

I’m always a fan of humanising villains, or at least making them more interesting than ‘just destroy everyone in sight’, and I did think that Cassandra Nova was a really interesting villain in this movie. I did cringe a whole lot at the way she read people’s minds, by forcing her fingers into their heads. That just made my skin crawl, even though she explained why she needed to do it that way.

I loved all of the easter eggs in this movie…and there were a lot. I was a bit surprised that the fight between Logan and Sabretooth lasted such a short amount of time, but with everything else happening in the movie, I guess I could understand why. I probably also missed a lot of the easter eggs in the movie, due to not being familiar with some of the comics.

So yeah, I have to say that this movie is definitely worth watching. It was a lot of fun and didn’t take itself seriously at all. In my opinion, if you’re a Marvel fan, you’ll really enioy this movie…but you don’t have to be overly familiar with the MCU to understand this movie.

Twisters

Posted by cat2002116 on July 28, 2024
Posted in: Disaster, Movies, Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

I’m pretty sure I did watch the original Twister movie, although all I really remember is that it showed a scene from The Shining on a TV screen at a gas station. Basically, I didn’t really remember much of the original when I went to see this one at the cinema.

I didn’t have huge expectations for this movie. Nothing to do with the movie itself, but I figured it wasn’t going to be a ‘difficult’ movie to watch…and since the last movie I saw at the cinema disappointed me, I didn’t want to get my hopes up too much.

I will say that this movie was a lot better and more engaging than I was expecting it to be. The very first scene starts with a group of five tornado chasers, who are actually trying an experiment to weaken and maybe even disrupt a tornado entirely. Right from the start, from that initial opening scene, I felt that this movie was doing more than I expected.

Unfortunately, I did get a bit confused between the characters who initially appeared in the opening scene. The beginning was incredibly intense, but because I didn’t know the characters very well, I didn’t have quite that emotional connection with them when the inevitable happened.

I did think this movie did a good job showing the obvious trauma Kate experienced after what happened to three of her friends. Having her take a completely different path to the trajectory she was originally on worked particularly well…and I could feel her discomfort when Javi reentered her life and wanted her to go back to doing what had caused her so much pain before.

I would have liked a bit more of a scientific explanation as to why Kate was able to tell which tornado was the one they needed to chase/which one was likely to wind down without actually causing damage. While there were some attempts to explain away that ability, there was a little too much reliance on instincts for the genre of this movie.

I will be honest that my first impression of Tyler was that he was a real jerk. It was good that, as the movie progressed, he was shown to have a lot more depth to him than I initially thought. I also really liked his bonds with his crew, although I would have liked a bit more detail about their history and how they all became friends/started working together.

I will say that I’m not a fan of Hollywood’s need to shoehorn romance into everything. I was more of a fan of the friendship bonds that formed…and I could have done without the whole ‘will they, won’t they’ between Kate and Tyler.

Apart from that, though, I did enjoy the movie as a whole. I can’t say that there were many easter eggs from the original movie in this, as I don’t remember the first movie, but I don’t think you need to have seen the original movie to be able to follow this one. I would definitely recommend watching this movie if you’re thinking about it.

Longlegs

Posted by cat2002116 on July 21, 2024
Posted in: Horror, Movies, Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , , . 1 Comment


So…from a fairly good horror movie to one that, in my opinion, was nowhere near as good as it could have been.

Okay, so this movie was one that I booked in to see at the cinema without knowing anything about it other than it being a horror movie. After I booked it, YouTube then decided to play a trailer for the movie while I was watching a video…and the trailer was really creepy and immediately spiked my interest.

Unfortunately, this was a case of the movie not living up to its potential.

I really struggled to connect to Lee as a character. I had no idea why she’d joined the FBI in the first place…and it was extremely confusing why they had a whole setup to determine psychic abilities. There really wasn’t enough worldbuilding to set up why Lee’s superiors would assume that her intuition would indicate psychic ability.

I struggled a lot with my suspension of disbelief; not just because of the aforementioned ‘she must be psychic!’ but also because it felt like the movie didn’t make a whole lot of sense as a whole. Lee is told about ten cases and spends a whole montage listening to 911 calls and looking at crime scene photos…and when she’s asked to give a report on what she’s learned, she says something along the lines of, ‘Two of the families had shotguns in the house. Eight used knives. And one had a hammer.” And this number added up to eleven. Not ten. There is an eleventh crime scene found, but no one mentions that she’s identified eleven cases and not ten? The series Medium did a far better job when the main character talks about a third victim and it turns out one of the murdered women was pregnant.

Speaking of the FBI, this line made me quite literally roll my eyes: ‘The father’s wounds appear to be self-inflicted, but we can’t be sure until we’re sure.’ I just…huh? What happened to Forensics? CSI? They were on the scene; I saw the jacket saying CSI!

One thing I found strange about this movie was the use of the camera angles. When Lee was talking to Ruth, and later to Carrie Ann, the camera just showed her face and then the face of the person she was talking to. It felt kind of like the filming of the two people hadn’t even taken place in the same location, as there were hardly any scenes showing them in the same shot. I figured Lee and Carrie Ann were seated opposite each other, but both of them were looking to the side, so…who knows?

I was also really disappointed in the titular character of this movie, played by Nicolas Cage. Especially recently, I’ve found that Cage’s acting is very over the top…and while that worked in Renfield and Dream Scenario, it really pulled me out of the movie in this case. Not that that was hard to do.

Sadly, the only good thing I can say about this movie…in my opinion…is that the trailer was pretty good. And that’s it. Unfortunately, the movie did not live up to my expectations…and I was pretty bored throughout.

I wouldn’t recommend watching this movie, which is a shame, because it looked like it was going to be a really good, scary supernatural horror.