Flavours of the Month: November 2018...

Carpenter classics, ascending zombies, and the biggest videogame release of the year are just some of what's been setting the tone of my November 2018...

Click "READ MORE" below to see this month's looks, sounds, vibes & flavours...

Daddy Grimes Edition: The Walking Dead 9x03 Meme...

Find more Walking Dead memes here.

So far so good for the ninth season of TWD. Under the leadership of Angela Kang (the new showrunner), the show has rediscovered not only its proper sense of pacing but the central thing that draws you in: interesting characters involved in complex conflicts. Many of the tweaks are subtle, but amount to a large and welcome rejuvenation which has gifted TWD a breath of fresh-but-familiar air. Here's hoping that Kang & Co can keep it up after the well-advertised and imminent departure of Rick Grimes...

Click image for FULL SIZE.

Click to Enlarge: Rick needs to catch Michonne up on the first two seasons...

The A-Team...

As a big fan of the original television show, when I first heard that an up-to-date movie adaptation was in the works, I wasn't exactly stoked. "How will they screw this up?" I wondered, what with there being so many slapdash remakes, re-imaginings and whatever you fancy, that haven't been up to snuff - or that have simply relieved themselves all over the source material.

Then the first snippets of information - notably, the cast list. Hannibal - check - Liam Neeson is generally awesome, but he was doubly-so in the kick arse action flick Taken, so I knew that was a good choice. Face - check - Bradley Cooper wasn't a particular name of note until The Hangover came along and he was good in that, and I could see him portraying the womanising charm of Templeton quite well, so that was another good choice.

Next up Murdock - check - I'd only seen Sharlto Copley in District 9, which was a great film, and I knew Copley would be able to bring out Murdock's lunacy. Afterall, he'd managed to turn a farty, pencil-neck bureaucrat into an arse kicking, metamorphosing hero in District 9. The only sticking point was Rampage Jackson, the UFC Fighter, as B.A. Baracus - hmmm - it was going to be a hard role to fill anyway, what with Mr. T being so iconic in the role.

Then the first footage came out, and then trailers, and still Rampage Jackson as Baracus was a sticking point for me - and others - his preview clips just weren't convincing, and it was starting to shape up as a properly fun time except for his involvement.

Then came the incessant advertising that was drawn out over months and months and months. It was cheeky enough that we in the UK were almost the last country in the world to get our mits on it, a full month after its native America got their teeth into it, but the endless trailers and Orange tie-in adverts in the cinema were just mind-numbing. A couple of viewings of the trailer is all I'd need as an average cinema-goer, so why on earth with the saturation?! It was an absolute relief to finally watch the actual movie, I can tell you!

Ah yes, the movie itself, thankfully it turned out as a good, solid fun time - Rampage Jackson included. Turns out in the context of the entire movie, and the other cast members, he was a good choice to bring Baracus into the 21st century. What relief indeed. The filmmakers might say "we told you so", but to be honest this sort of turn around is rare ... annoyingly your initial reactions are confirmed once you've stumped up your cash and endured the onslaught of car and vodka adverts (an odd sandwich of advertising, wouldn't you think?)

Adaptation wise, it's good. The transfer from Vietnam to Iraq is seemless, and the pre-amble showing how the team came together works well to introduce us all (franchise fans and newcomers alike) to the new breed of A-Team. Although more of the famous van would have been nice, but considering the plot it's understandable that it's not on screen for all that long. The filmmakers have done a good job of weaving in various nods and winks to the original show, while not being precious or cheesy or disrespectful about it - a nice balance is struck pretty much throughout, and like The Losers from a couple of months ago, this is a good slab of action movie fun and I look forward to seeing it again on DVD ... most of all so I can see the post-credits sequence featuring the original Face and Murdock.

When we went to see it in the cinema they put the big lights on part-way through the credits, which suggests that there's nothing more to see, so finding out there was another scene for the hardcore fans out there was most annoying. I'll just have to catch it on DVD - speaking of which, I hope we get a proper DVD release, not some half-arsed near-vanilla bit of old cobblers with sod all extras ... that's what happened to Kick Ass, a movie I really enjoyed, but which got a rubbish DVD and a solid Blu-Ray - and not being on the Blu-Ray bandwagon (can't afford it, plus the TV and surround to make it a worthwhile experience ... plus I don't like being bullied into a new format, nor do I like a DVD being half-arsed when I was ready and waiting to put down good money on it - well done movie studios, you lost yourself some money by screwing the DVD majority over on your releases!)

Anyway, rant over ... The A-Team was a welcome jolt of action movie fun and here's hoping the DVD is a quality release.

District 9...

For one reason or another, I hadn't been paying too much attention to this flick. I'd seen the teaser trailer when the alien's look was first revealed, and then months and months later I saw the trailer in the cinema a week before we went to actually see it.

I'd been aware of it in various discussions, or in magazine articles - I knew it was Neill Blomkamp's debut with Peter Jackson producing after their ill-fated attempt at getting the Halo movie off the ground (the trial/teasers of which were fucking awesome by the way) ... but yeah, I hadn't been paying a great deal of attention to this movie.

I'm kind of glad I didn't either, because that way I went in with zero expectation - hell, I wasn't entirely sure what I was in for. I had a good idea, but not entirely.

Well - put simply - I finally have the best movie I've seen so far this year (aside from Inglourious Basterds), and a sure-fire winner of a place in my Top 5 of 2009. There's been numerous movie's we've been to see this year...

*Role Models (Jan) - good fun, not incredible, but good fun.
*The Wrestler (Jan) - actually, come to think of it, fucking awesome.
*Friday the 13th 2009 (Feb) - slick pish, only the Jason stuff was any good, Derek Mears deserves better fare.
*Gran Torino (Mar) - classic Clint.
*Watchmen (Mar) - best Zack Snyder movie thus far (Yawn04 sucked copious balls, 300 was pish), but I didn't cream over it.
*Lesbian Vampire Killers (Mar) - has its moments, otherwise a let down.
*Crank 2: High Voltage (Apr) - actually, it was seriously bloody good fun.
*I Love You, Man (Apr) - solid fun, better than Role Models.
*Observe & Report (Apr) - crap.
*X-Men Origins (May) - decent action, not as good as X-Men 1 or 2, but better than X3.
*Drag Me To Hell (May) - seriously kick ass horror, despite the PG-13 rating.
*Terminator Salvation (Jun) - has a few moments, but overall it's limp ... better than T3 ... sucks compared to T1 or T2.
*The Hangover (Jun) - surprisingly good fun, crap trailer though.
*Doghouse (Jun) - solid horror comedy fun, but Danny Dyer's "geezer schtick" is wearing seriously thin.
*Transformers 2 (Jun) - TF1 was a lot better than this inconsistent, over-long, self-indulgent, curiously-sordid-for-a-family-blockbuster mish-mash.
*G.I. Joe (Aug) - some kick ass bits (the Paris chase, which is essentially real-life Team America haha, and Levitt's awesome Cobra Commander)
*Inglourious Basterds (Aug) - kicked ass, but a smidge too long.
*Funny People (Aug) - a let down from previous Apatow-directed flicks, but plenty of chuckles.

...it's been a mixed bag. The Wrestler, Crank 2, Drag Me To Hell, and Inglourious Basterds would have to be my highlights so far - so there we have it, those four and District 9 - that's my Top 5 of 2009 thus far.

However, it has been a year of many dashed expectations, as well as a number of modest let downs ... so it seems even more "hip-hip-hooray" when something seriously kick ass comes along - such as District 9.

It did perhaps lose some momentum when it shifted from pseudo-documentary to Fly-like tale of desperation, but even still, this is a seriously good sci-fi flick, and like all good sci-fi, it's not necessarily about the aliens, or gadgets, or guns or whatever. It's about ideas - in this case, apartheid, racism, segregation, immigration, untrustworthy governments, and slum-life.

Fortunately it didn't get too overt with these themes - they were just there within the film for those that wanted to find them could do, but even then it didn't beat you over the head with subtext. I was fearing that could happen, as the whole "white gubment evil, black gubment good" simplistic argument that gets trotted out by various Guardianistas all the time is tiring - life, simply, isn't that straight forward. Besides, the idea that skin colour affects the quality of governing intelligence is nothing short of insulting to any and all human beings, regardless of their colour or creed.

But yeah - fortunately it didn't get into club-heading political territory at all. Both the whites and blacks in Jo'burg are equally evil or equally innocent, heck, the main character starts out like a bit of a pitiable twat and then becomes a genuine hero who you can really respect - same goes for the aliens (or "prawns" as they're nick-named by the humans).

Also, on a budget of a relatively mere $30 million, the scale is damned impressive, and while the CGI aliens may not be the most convincing CGI you'll have seen, their innate humanity (in their movement and their dialogue and how they're treated by mankind) will easily make you overlook the downside.

Visually the film is arresting, the constant mix-up of pseudo-documentary footage, CCTV clips, and docu-style traditional-fourth-wall stuff works perfectly. It's mixed from pretty much the beginning, so it never feels clunky, or out-of-pace throughout ... which had been a slight worry ahead of time, but I needn't have fretted.

Why bother ranting on and on though, District 9 is a seriously good sci-fi outing, and while a sequel isn't necessary, I'd still go and see one (just as long as they keep the quality up, naturally). Hopefully this can act as a calling card to re-open the Halo movie door, because ... yeah ... those teasers on YouTube kick ass.