You’ve arrived at the blog of Emrys of the House Moungabio, first of his name, watcher of films, reader of comics and ordained Dudeist Reverend (also – someone who just recently got into Game of Thrones).
ie. this guy —>
Here, you’ll find all my thoughts on the films that fascinate me (for good or ill), the TV series’ I’ve binged or the games I’ve played. It’s also become the new home of my comic book site, New to Comics. So if you like Star Wars, Marvel, DC, Game of Thrones and all that other geeky goodness, you’ve come to the right place.
As with everything in life, the blog is still a work in progress, but stick around for the journey! If you’re interested in all the things I am, leave a comment, a like, or follow me on Twitter @EmrysM94 to let me know.
I was planning to write a spoiler review for Spider-Man: Far From Home, but I’m not sure I have enough I want to say that’s worth a whole article, so instead, I’ve decided to talk about another passion of mine.
One of the key facets of nerd culture is collecting things. While I have a rather large stack of Spider-Man comics, and I hope to one day ‘Catch ‘Em All’ in the Pokémon games, my main focus of collecting is LEGO. Not anything and everything, so much as just specific sets. At the moment, I’m hoping to collect a series of nine sets that represent each film in the Skywalker Saga, and with the final film hitting cinemas this December, I’ve decided to start talking about them, starting with my newest acquisition and the representative of A New Hope: The X-Wing.
Based on: The T-65B X-Wing Starfighter / Star Wars Pieces: 729 Year: 2018
The LEGO X-Wing Starfighter set hit shelves in 2018 alongside a slew of sets based on Solo: A Star Wars Story. This set, however, is taken directly from the end of the original Star Wars, and features Luke Skywalker, R2-D2, Biggs Darklighter and R2-Q2.
The official RRP of the set is £89.99, which is quite pricey. As a result, it usually has a discount attatched that brings it down to around £67 – £74. Still overpriced, but a lot better than the official £90 price tag.
Fortunately, I managed to bag a deal on eBay for £23.50, with an extra £3.48 for postage.
Marvel’s Infinity Saga comes to a close this week with Spider-Man: Far From Home. That means, once again, it’s time to rank all the movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, from worst to best.
I originally wrote this post last year, however, as I mentioned last time, opinions change, and new films come out, so this time around, some films are in a different spot, and four new films have been added to the list.
That’s right, not three, four – I’m also throwing Venom into the mix, due to the fact Sony clearly want it to be a part of the MCU, and there have been a fair few rumours and speculative articles as of late regarding a potential Spider-Man/Venom crossover. God help us.
If you’re not caught up, there will be the occasional spoiler for these films, however, the one from Spider-Man: Far From Home isn’t major, in my opinion, and is something that people with knowledge of Spider-Man will probably already know.
RELEASED: July 2nd 2019 DIRECTED BY: Jon Watts WRITTEN BY: Chris McKenna & Erik Sommers PRODUCED BY: Kevin Feige & Amy Pascal MUSIC BY: Michael Giacchino STARRING: Tom Holland, Jake Gyllenhaal, Zendaya, Jacob Batalon, Angourie Rice, Tony Revolori, Remy Hii, Marisa Tomei, Jon Favreau, Martin Starr, J. B. Smoove, Cobie Smulders & Samuel L. Jackson
After the universe-shaking events of Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man: Far From Home closes out the Infinity Saga with an epilogue of sorts, and follows Peter Parker recovering from the loss of Tony Stark and hoping to get away from it all by going on vacation with his classmates. However, his holiday is interrupted by the arrival of Nick Fury and Mysterio, who put Spider-Man to work saving Europe from the monstrous Elementals.
Much like Spider-Man: Homecoming, Far From Home presents audiences with a Peter Parker who is much closer to the classic Spider-Man than the depictions seen in the Raimi Trilogy and the Amazing duology. Tom Holland nails the depiction of Peter Parker, reaffirming that he is the greatest Spider-Man commited to film. His stories manage to perfectly juggle the superheroics with the high-school drama, and his chemistry with his fellow cast members is outstanding. The relationship between him and Zendaya’s MJ is particularly adorable and feels very genuine in regards to actual high school romances.
RELEASED: June 21st 2019 DIRECTED BY: Lars Klevberg WRITTEN BY: Tyler Burton Smith PRODUCED BY: David Katzenberg & Seth Grahame-Smith MUSIC BY: Bear McCreary STARRING: Gabriel Bateman, Aubrey Plaza, Brian Tyree Henry, David Lewis, Carlease Burke & Mark Hamill
Full disclosure, I’ve never watched any of the Child’s Play/Chucky movies before this one. But I feel like this was a bad place to start, because this is a very weird film.
Child’s Play follows Andy, a young kid (played by Gabriel Bateman) living with his young mother, Karen (Aubrey Plaza), whose birthday is coming up soon. Low on money, Karen manages to acquire a faulty ‘Buddi’ toy doll from her workplace, which names itself Chucky, and becomes more and more violent and possessive as their relationship develops.
RELEASED: May 23rd 2014 DIRECTED BY: Bryan Singer WRITTEN BY: Simon Kinberg, Jane Goldman & Matthew Vaughn PRODUCED BY: Bryan Singer, Simon Kinberg, Lauren Shuler Donner & Hutch Parker MUSIC BY: John Ottman STARRING: Hugh Jackman, James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Evan Peters, Halle Berry, Shawn Ashmore, Ellen Page, Omar Sy, Daniel Cudmore, Fan Bingbing, Adan Canto, Booboo Stewart, Peter Dinklage, Josh Helman, Patrick Stewart & Ian McKellen
I remember when Days of Future Past first came out, I didn’t think it was as strong as everyone else seemed to. I saw it while visiting the United States, and while I did enjoy it, I’m not sure I’ve actually watched it since.
However, watching it again with X-Men and X2 fairly fresh in my mind has made the film much stronger. From the opening titles really hammering down how this is just as much a sequel to the original films as well as First Class, this film, while not without its faults and timeline blunders, is a very well executed movie.
RELEASED: July 26th 2013 DIRECTED BY: James Mangold WRITTEN BY: Mark Bomback & Scott Frank PRODUCED BY: Lauren Shuler Donner & Hutch Parker MUSIC BY: Marco Beltrami STARRING: Hugh Jackman, Rila Fukushima, Tao Okamoto, Hiroyuki Sanada, Will Yun Lee, Svetlana Khodchenkova, Haruhiko Yamanouchi & Famke Janssen
In a radical departure from X-Men Origins, Logan returns in The Wolverine, plucking us out of the past escapades of First Class and returning us to the present timeline.
The film sees Logan, now a destitute hermit, struggling to deal with the deaths of Jean Grey and everyone else he loves. However, he is pulled out of his wallowing by a young woman called Yukio, who summons him to Japan to say his goodbyes to Yashida, a Japanese soldier he saved in World War II. However, Logan soon becomes embroiled in a plot involving the future of Yashida’s family, as his powers mysteriously start to fail him.
It’s clear when watching this film and those around it, that Fox were desperately trying to wipe Origins out of audiences minds. As far as I can tell, there’s only one reference to that film in this one, and it’s so subtle that you could miss it if you weren’t paying attention. In spite of that, however, it’s one of the few X-Men films post Last Stand that actually adheres to continuity. The only thing that comes close to breaking it is the mid-credits scene, but that can be explained away by paying close attention the film it references (again, The Last Stand).
We’re done with the older series of films, and now we’re onto the new, as today’s review takes us back to the current focus of X-Men films, the ‘First Class’.
RELEASED: June 1st 2011 DIRECTED BY: Matthew Vaughn WRITTEN BY: Matthew Vaughn, Ashley Edward Miller, Zack Stentz, Jane Goldman, Sheldon Turner & Bryan Singer PRODUCED BY: Lauren Shuler Donner, Bryan Singer, Simon Kinberg & Gregory Goodman MUSIC BY: Henry Jackman STARRING: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, January Jones, Nicholas Hoult, Oliver Platt, Jason Flemyng, Lucas Till, Edi Gathegi, Caleb Landry Jones, Zoë Kravitz, Álex Gonzalez & Kevin Bacon
For the longest time, I’ve thought of First Class as my favourite X-Men film (and yes, that’s including Logan and Deadpool). As I go through and rewatch them all, I’m not entirely sure that’s the case anymore, but it’s still definitely up there.
First Class follows Charles Xavier in his younger years, as he becomes a Professor and is recruited by Moira MacTaggert of the CIA to investigate the mutant society known as the Hellfire Club. Their leader, Sebastian Shaw, is planning an extinction-level event that will place mutants at the forefront of society, and the only way for Charles and Moira to stop him is to assemble the first class of X-Men – the Nazi-hunting Magneto, the shape-changing Mystique, the genius inventor Beast, the survivalist Darwin, the explosive Havok, the goofball Banshee and the exotic Angel Salvadore.
