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Reviews
Ryu ga gotoku 7: Hikari to yami no yukue (2020)
Finally an RPG where you play as a broke 35+ protagonist!
This game is truly peak. In what other game do you actually get to be in an RPG party where everyone is 30+ and broke? But that's just one awesome part of many that contributes to one of the best games ever.
The story is a wild ride from start to finish that throws so many unexpected turns at you, just about all of which had foreshadowing you wouldn't see otherwise. I wasn't expecting the ending at all, and it even made me shed a tear (I won't say what type, no spoilers)... just a really great emotional journey with excellent music and voice acting. So much of it is contrived soap operaesque nonsense, but they do it so well you cant help getting sucked into the story and loving all the characters. It was a real treat hearing George Takei in the dub too. PLAY THIS GAME.
City Playhouse (2024)
Excellent Short Film
The framing, lighting, and sound work were all excellent for such a short film and small production. In particular, Gil Zachodin was incredible as Wyatt. He showed a real range of facial expressions and subtle changes in body language as the story progressed. Everyone's acting together with the lighting, framing, sound and everything else came together really well. The story was a nice look into the psychology of how people deal with established norms beginning to change, and a loss of security they used to have. They managed to capture a lot in 10 minutes. Great short film. 11/10 would highly recommend!
The Time Traveler's Wife (2022)
Renew this series!!!
I originally watched this because I heard Theo James was naked in every episode, and he was, which was amazing (especially because there was no female nudity-- and we never get that), but I got so much more than hot female gaze!!! I got a really interesting time travel sci-fi/fantasy adventure romance that always kept me thinking and wondering what was going to happen next. The way time travel is explored here is pretty unique compared to how it shows up in other media. Theo James and Rose Leslie have incredible chemistry in this show, even if I thought some elements of their relationship were a little weird (and the show even jokes about them at times), their chemistry overrides all of that. We also get to see great range from Theo James, playing himself at different ages and interacting with himself. When I finished the show I was so disappointed to learn HBO wasn't going to give it a second season. The story isn't finished, and I still had so many questions about what was going to happen, or if they were going to make any changes to the ending of the book. I hope another streaming service is able to save this great series!!
Umineko When They Cry (2007)
The Greatest Piece of 21st Century Media
Umineko is the greatest piece of literature I have ever read. It's a life changing experience. I learned more from Umineko about how to improve my outlook on life than I did in therapy. This story has some of the most well written female antagonists I've ever seen, and they're written in a way that makes them empathetic, which is a wonderful deviation from the norm. The only way I can put into words how good this story is, is to say it was written with love. It does an amazing job of portraying a lot of dark depressing themes in an amazingly meaningful and hopeful way.
The soundtrack is easily one of the best soundtracks to ever exist. There are so many good tracks it's difficult to even form a top 10 list.
If you plan on reading I suggest going into it with as little knowledge as possible and seriously trying to solve the mysteries for yourself to get the most out of it.
It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia: The Nightman Cometh (2008)
One of the funniest episodes in the series
This episode never fails to crack me up. Peak comedy. The songs are hilarious, the acting is hilarious, every line is delivered perfectly. This is easily one of the top 10 episodes of the series and possibly the best Charlie episode of all time.
Castlevania: It's Been a Strange Ride (2021)
Worst way to end this series
First, before I share any of my opinions: If you're going to put a suicide in a show, there should be a content warning. There wasn't a Netflix content warning on day 1 and there still isn't one. There is also no message before the credits roll with information on the suicide hotline.
Now for my review. Everyone saying this series had a nice happy ending must have skipped the first 10 minutes, which contains the most glorified suicide I have ever seen in my life. Suicide is framed as the solution to Lenore's problems, Hector, who was willing to DIE for her and said he wanted to be with her a few episodes ago, weakly tries to stop her, but then watches her walk into the sun and is seemingly ok?? Watching someone you're on friendly terms with kill themselves should shake anyone. Them going extra hard on the composting and music only served to further glorify her suicide. This show seemed to use a lot of dark themes for shock value but didn't bother to develop them in a meaningful way. This was extremely depressing, I found it personally triggering because of a total lack of any type of content warning, and it was even more disturbing to see it followed by the most nonsensical deus ex machina happy endings that are an insult to the gothic horror genre. This completely ruins the season and series for me.
The trios story would have felt more meaningful if Trevor died.
Dracula and Lisa coming back was stupid and pure fanservice. They seemed content being in hell together in season 3. There was no reason for them to come back. And with Lenore's death implying that the only moral thing a vampire can do is end themselves lest they go insane, we can only assume Dracula will go crazy and start a genocidal quest again.
Castlevania: The Good Dream (2020)
Best Story Epsiode
Best episode story wise this season, possibly in the whole series. We have Lenore taking Hector on walkies, the most iconic scene with incredible storyboarding when she takes the leash off of him, then we have St. Germain going on the coolest acid trip in the infinite corridor, and Isaac having one of the most interesting and creepy conversations in the series. And Taka and Sumi aren't in this episode!!! Only bad thing about this episode was Sypha and Trevor implied to be banging without Alucard there, or without even thinking about him.