The Written Podcast: Lunch Breaks

Having a lunch break can make or break a working day. A lunch break can help you not only feed yourself to regain energy and drink to keep hydrated, but to wind down from the working environment. From the moment you walk into the building you could be bombarded with series of questions relating to matter that may or may not have happened a couple of weeks ago of which you’re vaguely familiar of because you heard someone talk about said problem briefly on passing whilst on route to the toilets – and then suddenly you’re expected to be the expect of that problem, and solve it instantly with every small piece of detail and knowledge to keep everyone happy, even though you know perfectly well that no matter how much information you can provide and/or how much you even state you don’t have a clue what they are talking about; no one is ever going to be happy with your answer(s). I may have gotten a bit carried away there.

So when it comes to the much needed lunch break, you simply cannot wait to walk out of the building, leaving everyone else to deal with the tattered remains of some semblance that’s supposed to be a solution to a problem you’re not even sure was the one you started trying to fix two hours ago, but at this point every problem just blends into one, so when lunch comes around, who really knows at that point.

Whilst in the working environment, you have four types of people: Those who take lunch and those who do not, and those who think they’re not have a lunch but we all know they do, and then there are those who talk about what they’re going to have for lunch as if it’s some special banquette with a member of the royal family. Those who take lunch, take it religiously, every day, no matter what, at the same time, no matter what. Their time comes, they are out the door, leaving behind a dusty outline of themselves, evaporating all over you work, reminding you just how much time you’ve got left before it’s your time to make a statement. Those who don’t take a lunch, simply don’t have a lunch. If their job is to sit behind a desk, that’s exactly what they’ll do all day until it’s time to go home, ploughing on through their work.

Those who don’t take lunch are simply mind-blowing to those who do, because the people who do take lunch, if they’re required to stay behind just for a minute before heading off, it’s simply just too much effort. Expect an incredible amount of complaining about what time they got up in the morning, how little sleep they had, and if they don’t get a rest they’ll be burnt out and unable to continue, and for the rest of the day will be moping around because they didn’t get the full hour they do 99.99% have without any issues. In the meantime, those who don’t take lunch are observing the over-acting performance whilst proving just how much of a machine they are – before ultimately burning themselves eventually from lack of any proper rest, but they’re committed to not taking lunch because they have a point to prove to those who do take lunch – even though those who do take lunch will never understand what that point is so it would absolutely be meaningless to try and prove said point. Do they even know what the point they want to make is?

Those who do think they’re not getting a lunch but we all know they do; pop over the road to grab their food. You see, those who don’t take lunch, brings their food in with them so they don’t have to get up, but those who think they don’t take a lunch pops over the road and do their weekly shopping around the supermarket before popping back with fifteen minutes before the official end of their “would be” lunch break. Then, at the end of the day, at precisely the same time every day, without fail, they declare they’ve not had a break to everyone in the room, just to make sure it’s understood just how much of a trooper they are, and how committed they are to the team – whilst the kitchen’s fridge is packed full of groceries.

And finally, there are those who talk about what they’re going to have for lunch from the moment they step in through the door. Once lunch is over, they’ll discuss what they had in great detail, because we all want to know exactly how many pickles their burger had and how there was just too much sauce it dripped all over the place and at the end it disintegrated and they had to scoop the remnants of a burger from their tray and stuff it in their talkative mouth. The only time they’re not talking about their dinner is when they’re chewing it. This is where those people who do and do not take lunches unite – to complain about those who talk about every minute detail about their lunch. For a brief moment, for only but a couple of minutes, those who do and do not take lunches are on the same page, understanding each other, getting along with each other and laughing together, until it’s lunch time and the person who takes lunch disappears like Houdini right in front of everyone’s eyes.

Whilst on lunch, the environment changes and there are only two types of people; those who just want to be left alone but will take part in some conversations if talked to, and those who just don’t stop talking about what they’re going to be doing over the weekend or the previous weekend or that evening or the previous evening. Unbeknownst to both types of people, they are enemies.

They’re enemies because those who want to be left alone actually do want to be left alone and have time to themselves but kept on being disturbed and to keep piece they just take part out of curtesy, but mainly only listens, not really pay much attention to the full one-sided conversation, nods their heads smiles when appropriate and then lunch is over. Whilst having someone who basically only listens to what they’ve got to say does sound appetising to those who talks too much – it’s actually rather annoying. Every time they take a breath or end a sentence, those who want to be left alone goes back to being on their own, either read a book or watch the TV, or anything not connected to listening to the other person’s rambles. This creates a fissure between the two, as those who talk too much thinks the other person is being rude and not paying any attention.

But the two personality traits of the lunchbreak environment are so strong everyone immediately snaps into whichever one suits them the most. And the moment lunch ends, no comment is made about the battle of the two traits and the day continues forward.

I said at the beginning of this article that lunch can either make or break a working day, and I haven’t really explained how, just who attends or doesn’t attends lunch. It can make or break a day depends on what happens immediately after lunch is over. You can go away, leaving the office in disarray, and completely forget that you could come back in the same amount of disarray that was there when you left. You can feel rejuvenated after a good lunch, especially if you have the food you so fondly enjoy (the same meal deal you always have with no changes whatsoever, because thinking of having something different is just too risky as you might not actually like it and then the who lunch is ruined) but the moment you come back and are loaded with about a thousand different problems, all that rejuvenation goes straight out of the window, making you wonder if you had actually taken a lunch, but just skipped forward an hour in time. It can make your day if you come back and all is quiet – you leave pandemonium, you come back to piece. What could be more satisfying?

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Film of the Week: Toy Story 4

Spoilers throughout

I was not expecting how this film ends. I was, however, fully expectant of being completely emotionally broken by the end of the film. Toy Story 4 was not going to be made until John Lasseter liked the script. Toy Story 3 was the perfect ending to a trilogy, by passing the toys onto a new owner, Bonnie, beginning a new era. Toy Story 4 is continuing on from that life-changing moment, and the toys embark on another epic adventure, in the form of a road trip to a fair, but with a new toy. Forky is most definitely a toy, much to everyone’s and his surprise. Synonymous to Buzz Lightyear’s first moments with Andy, discovering and learning that he’s a toy, Forky follows the same path, but with Bonnie.

Having grown up with the Toy Story franchise, when Andy passed them onto someone who would play with them more than he would as he was heading off to college, it truly felt like an end of an era. When Pixar announced they were in the process of making a fourth, whilst of course the first question was “what will they do?” but this is Pixar we’re talking about. They don’t mess around. They know what they’re doing. So, you can imagine how it must have felt when Woody said goodbye to the gang I had grown up with. That was heart breaking, but was the perfect progression for those characters.

Bonnie is not Andy, that was instantly established as the film starts off, and with Woody having been in Andy’s arms for so long, it’s understandable he’s having a hard time moving on, and even harder still when Bonnie doesn’t pick him to play with but instead with the rest of the toys, even making Jessie the new sheriff. Woody had always had a crush on Bo Beep, that was seen way back in Toy Story 1, so when they meet up again and get the opportunity to stay together since Bonnie doesn’t play with Woody anymore, it made sense to stay with Bo.

If you want to observe Pixar’s incredible leaps in animation, then look at the Toy Story franchise, because if you compare the animation in Toy Story 4 with the first film, they have come a long way since then. The main reason why they focused on toys with their first feature length film is because they couldn’t quite get humans right – they just looked like plastic toys themselves. Now, Andy and the rest of the humans look like actually people. Pixar has developed so many kinds of software to create what we would consider the mundane in everyday life, like bin bags – it’s amazing seeing everything they’ve created, learnt, and taught themselves over the years in one film, I was almost in tears just thinking about that.

And of course, it wouldn’t be a Pixar film is it wasn’t filled with plenty of Easter eggs, and I did spot a couple here and there, but given the next opportunity I will absolutely comb through the film to make sure I pick up as many as I can – the antique shop had probably so many I missed more than half.

Keep up the good work Pixar – I’m already looking forward to your next film, Onward.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Mum's Monday: Years and Years

Warning Spoilers

In the first episode, it gets off to a confusing start as to how the characters/families are set up, but at the moment the focus is on what is being said on the TV. So there is time and it is not important at this time to know where the characters all fit in this program. The speech Daniel (Russell Tovey) gave at the hospital after Lincoln was born is sadly truthful. What follows can only be seen as guess work over the years, but in-keeping with world events and not going over the top. Now we are five years later, the face technology is sadly, good and funny. This episode has now taken a very political, sensitive and dark turn off events. Trans human sounds interesting but strange, it is however, clever how realistic it could be. The episode is confusing again, I’m sure it was mentioned Gran Muriel (Anne Reid) had died. The conversation after a revelation that wasn’t the character they meant is cleverly scripted and yes germs not existing is weirdly believable. It turns out robots could be really useful in the future. Moving on, I don’t know how likely it is a nuclear weapon would be launched, but this is still scripted as not over the top for this program. This looks to be a hard hitting drama.

The second episode, it is confusing as to what year it is. It starts off with some sad news and there are nicer/better ways of telling your family, this news is devastating to them. This program takes replacing humans and jobs with technology to a whole new level. It is also, personally to me, a little creepy having your hand as your phone. Even the thought of it makes me feel a little ill. Sadly, this could be a real thing in the future, which makes it even stranger. It is heart-warming to see the family reunited. It is sad to see Viktor (Maxim Baldry) having to leave, but there could be a light at the end of the tunnel. However, it is sad to see how another country see and treat a person who is gay. I can see how ‘The Blink’ can be a good idea. it is good to see that Stephen (Rory Kinnear) and his family, wife Celeste (T’Nia Miller) and their two daughters Bethany (Lydia West) and Ruby (Jade Alleyne) have somewhere to live, not so good losing all that money. I wander how that will turn out.

In episode three, I am so glad Viktor is found. It is interesting to see how far food and how to heat it has changed. Sadly, it does mean another job lost. Despite the loss to the family we find out how the family all fit in. it is weird to see in this program they have changed funerals. Bethany is in Liverpool ‘A camera eye’ it looks and is horrendous. A new world. Stephen, Steven (Craig Gazey)

In episode four, Europe is imploding there is ‘Grexit’ where Greece is leaving the European union and Hungary has gone bankrupt. However, life for the Lyons family is carrying on as normal. I don’t want to say this episode is becoming far-fetched, but Spain has gone from now in 2019, where I have heard ‘The most popular holiday destination’ to in this series ‘You only go there if it is essential travel’. The writers have really used their imaginations so you are glad this is only a fictional drama. Now we see compulsory voting in the general election. It is good to see love put above everything. Sadly, it isn’t all legal what is being discussed and carried out, but I really feel for the characters. Steven’s world has imploded and Daniel and Viktor’s life centres around getting home. The year 2027. How could they! The writers. Such a devastating and shocking ending to this episode. Ultimately it is nice to see Celeste and Muriel reconcile their differences.

In episode five, when Edith (Jessica Hynes) starts talking about the ‘Disappeared’ it has an air of ‘Doctor Who’ vibe about it. It isn’t necessarily Si Fi fiction like the brilliant program of ‘Doctor Who’ and what it aims for and achieves so well, this series however, is absolutely meant to represent real life. I can see some truth in what is happening as the characters are starting the year 2028. It is nice to see the eye surgery went well and ultimately the heart-warming reaction from Celeste when the family celebration doesn’t turn out as planned. It is inevitable that somethings will never change as in ‘Conspiracy Theories’ and there always seems to be a slither of doubt in an argument. Did the nuclear bomb happen, leading to the bank collapse? If it didn’t, you could say there is proof, Edith is not dead, despite being close to the radioactive area and was infected/affected. It is weird hearing that Bethany has seen filing cabinets in ‘Films’, ‘Period Dramas’. It is little snippets of script like that that enhances the futuristic nature of this series. Now the program is slowly turning into a spy series and has strange new laws.

In the sixth and final episode of the series, at the meal it is lovely, amazing and heart-warming to have Celeste included in the division of the house sale profit. After, the speech Muriel makes at the dinner table is brilliant, is so truthful and made me think to the extent of ‘Blowing my mind’ with the actual realisation of how society could become, as we see the start of it even now in 2019. The ‘War’ has started, one family rose up. Enough is enough. And Edith is that you?

Overall this was a weird and intriguing series. Really it is just about a family getting on with their lives with all the political upheaval and strange technology in the background. It just works as a unique and original drama.

The Written Podcast: A British Rant - Turn Your Lights On When Driving in The Rain

I was travelling to work last week when it was raining. It wasn’t torrential rain, but it was raining hard enough to generate a lot of spray. In most instances of any amount of rain, traffic on the roads slow right down. It is understandable that traffic does slow due to the road condition being below the recommended conditions for travelling at the speed limit of 70MPH. With puddles forming on the road, spray from lorries being kicked up in the air, and the rain itself pelting the windscreen at a constant rate the wipers are having a difficult time keeping the screen clear for at least a second, then slowing down in order to keep yourself from spiralling out of control and damaging either yourself or your car is a logical reaction – I have no problem with traffic being slower than the speed limit when it is raining at a high rate.

I have experienced rain so hard that traffic slowed right down to crawling speed, with the wipers at maximum speed, but to no avail. I almost had to pull over and wait for it to ease up before continuing my journey, but I decided to continue forward, so long as I just keep it at a decent speed for the conditions, and I factored in being in a mini-bus at the time, allowing me to see above the roofs of cars and further on in the distance, so I could prepare for any moments the traffic came to a stop for a few seconds before continuing once more. That was the hardest rain I’ve ever been in whilst within a vehicle, so thankfully I didn’t get wet.

When it is raining, visibility lowers dramatically. The harder the rain the lower the visibility – it’s standard common sense. With visibility lowering the harder the rain that’s coming down, it some cases day can become extremely dull. Not anywhere close to simulating night, but the clouds were thick enough and dark grey enough block out a decent percentage of the sun’s rays. And with spray being constantly thrown in the air, and the rain itself pelting the windscreen, it’s logical to turn your car’s lights on. But, some people do not turn their lights on, and that infuriates me.

I honestly don’t care if you’re driving a bright pink car, turn your lights on. I don’t care if you’re driving a massive eighteen-wheeler lorry, turn your lights on. I don’t care if there aren’t that many vehicles on the road, turn your lights on. Just because the time is twelve-noon, when the sun is at its highest point in the sky, doesn’t mean you’re not supposed to turn your lights on – it’s still heavily cloudy and dull. Do these people not turn their lights on during the night also? Of course they turn their lights on, otherwise no one would be able to see them either coming or going… which, when in heavy rainfall, is the very reason why you need to turn them on, so people can see you coming and going. It is ludicrous that people think it is perfectly safe not to turn their lights on when their own vision is lowered due to the weather. The irony is, if they crash into someone who doesn’t have their lights on because they couldn’t see the other car. That’ll be a conversation I’d like to hear – an argument which nobody is in the right; they are both stupid enough to have caused the accident in the first place. If they both had their lights on and were still involved in an accident, then if one person didn’t see the other person even with the lights on, then the causer needs to take their driving lesson again, or an eye test, or both, depending on the severity of the crash.

But the fact that amazes me more than anything else is not only seeing just the one person on the road who believes they can get away with it, but there are numerous vehicles on the road without lights on. I can’t give you the ratio between lights and no lights, but there shouldn’t be as many as I always see when driving in the rain, especially when visibility is incredibly low, especially so, when driving through the worst rainfall I’ve ever experienced when driving.

It’s unnecessary dangerous for other road users. When driving, you don’t have to look out for yourself, but instead watch other road users. If you were to drive exactly how you are meant to when taking your driving test, you’d crash. There are too many people on the road who believe they own the road, who think they can get away with so much, and then wonder why they get in trouble with either the Police or other road users. I will admit, I’ve developed a few bad habits over the years I’ve been driving – but I don’t speed, I don’t deliberately cut people up only by complete accident, I don’t tailgate people, and I always turn my lights on when driving in the rain. I have caught numerous people doing blatantly dangerous manoeuvres on my dash-cam, I’d spend most of my free time uploading videos showcasing these careless drivers to the internet. And besides, what would be the point of uploading the videos anyway, it’s not as if anything is ever going to be done about it.

I see countless videos of these daring drivers, so they do get noticed and commented on, and with so many videos circulating the internet at a fast pace, I don’t doubt those who performed the certain perilous acts saw themselves in the video and read the comments and maybe the actually learnt something of value, hopefully not to do it ever again and be more careful when on the road. But again, those who do learnt something is vastly lower than those who just don’t care about anything, including their own or other people’s safety, so the odds of one of my videos actually making a different is slim and therefore, a waste of my time attempting such.

It’s not hard to turn their lights on, it’s just flicking or twisting a switch. It’s not as if you have to reconfigure the entire car just to make the lights come on, so please if you are one of those people who don’t turn your lights on when visibility is noticeably different, turn your lights on, it’ll make things so much simpler, safer, and gives other road users a chance to see you – a couple of seconds is all that’s needed between an accident happening, and not.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Film of the Week: The Nun

The Nun is a spin-off from the Conjuring series, and if you believe in the Warren’s stories, unfortunately this isn’t one they had experienced, but instead completely made up by the filmmakers. First introduced in the second Conjuring as a side story for Lorraine Warren. Whilst the Nun is a demon known as Valak, it isn’t a part of Ed and Warren’s vast catalogue of stories they’ve told over the years, because it never happened.

The Nun is the type of supernatural horror movie you’d expect if you want something to truly scare you. It’s primed with many jump scares, but it does fit in well with the style of the Conjuring movies, but having things stand in the background and move just out of sight to create the eerie atmosphere, to keep the hairs on the back of your neck standing up on end at all times.

You can see a few classic scenes which can be argued as being clichéd, but on defence of that; just how many times can you make a supernatural horror film with different angles here and there. You can put your own spin on the matter, which is exactly what happens in this film with entities standing and moving in the background, but the slow camera angles, the intense focus on the character’s face, the slow walk through the corridors, things going pump behind the characters – they’re all tropes which cannot be avoided when making this type of horror film, just put your own spin on it as best as you can.

There are plenty of moments in the film where the audience fully expect something to be there, but nothing’s there at all, and then once the initial expectations has subsided, the jump scare happens – designed to create the biggest scare possible. This is another trait considered to be a cliché, because if we the audience sees this enough times, we’re going to expect nothing to be there and then something happen a little later, distinguishing the fear the filmmakers want to create. What would have made this a much scarier film is if they went against the expectations and put the jump scares exactly where we expect nothing to be there, defying our expectations and completely catch us off guard – therefore we jump out of our seats and enjoy the horror movie that much more. Although I can’t really pin this down as a criticism toward the movie, rather at the genre itself.

The Nun is actually a good movie. The scare factor is purely down to personal preference. If you’ve seen a lot of horror movies, maybe you won’t be as scared as someone who dabbles in the genre not that often. If you scare easily, then this film will truly keep you on edge even during the calm moments, but if it takes a lot to scare you and your bottom stayed firmly on the chair throughout with flinching an inch, you can at least appreciate the story the film has, and it is a decent one to stay infested in. Full of enough backstory to flesh out the characters but also to keep exposition down so to focus on what is truly necessary which is telling the story via visual elements, and has a good twist near the end, a twist you’d certainly wouldn’t have seen coming but the moment it happens, it immediately becomes obvious.

Considering this is the fifth film the Conjuring Universe, because this is an original story, genuinely something which can be enjoyed – whilst also paying homage to the Conjuring films which this film is connected to. I’m happy to recommend this film.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Mum's Monday: Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor

The start of the film is a mix of two boys just playing and ultimately having an exhilarating life changing experience, and a lesson in war is not an event to use against someone. It is sad to see that a boy mixing up his letters in the past was seen as ‘Stupid’ when we know as in the nature of this film he has so much more he can contribute to life, proving life is not all academic.

Sadly, the reference to the first world war, although commonly used as in ‘The war to end all wars’ we know the second world war happened, but it is nice to hear that there was hope for no more death and destruction in war.

It is amusing to see the medical centre and checks; it was harsh in more ways than one, but it is what the government wants so the government gets it. So we know Rafe (Ben Affleck) gets his letters mixed up but is an excellent pilot with perfect eyesight, and deserves to keep his wings. So yes he needs help, but it has been bought to my attention as to what use is a cheat sheet. Surely he would mix that up too. They could have come up with a better story line as to how he met Evelyn (Kate Beckinsale)

It is strangely amusing how many jabs Rafe ended up having and the resulting busted nose loosely what you could call a date. Now Rafe is off to join the British war effort and Evelyn and Danny (Josh Hartnett) are off to Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

You now see the usual long distance relationship, letter writing, this is all interweaved in the fact a war is going on. However, in a film about Pearl Harbor, why have the British element in it? A love triangle could have happened anyway. This film doesn’t need the British war scenes. There have been many films called by different titles to where and when they have been set so the film all fits. This film is called ‘Pearl Harbor’ but with much more other events going on, this film should have been called by another title to accommodate all of this film.

It is nice to see Danny be there for Evelyn when tragedy strikes, and this film also shows, that true to form, friends do fight.

Now the war has hit Pearl Harbor but this film still cuts away from the attack to focus on Danny and Rafe. If they were closer to the action like on an airfield that would have been more appropriate as to them taking planes up and shooting down enemy planes. I know the attack was unexpected but the two main characters should have been in the centre of it, there was a known choice for that to happen in this film.

Due to the nature of the surprise attack the way the nurses and the army men/pilots reacted was well done. It is tragic that it wasn’t just the men on the ships that were killed. The action scenes and the special effects are done well.

To see the nurses working under pressure reinforces the dramatic nature of the surprise attack and is realistically done well.

Now we move on to the revenge attack making this film too long and diverse to be called just ‘Pearl Harbor’

It is heart-warming to see Rafe step up after tragedy strikes and all the men get the recognition for the parts they played in the war effort.

Everyone who deserves credit should get it. Whoever they are or where ever they come from.

The Written Podcast: Papers, Please – A Game That Makes You Nervous

Papers, Please has been out for some time now. Talking about it may seem a little redundant, as many people have already. Videos have been made of the game and discussions have been had about the morals within the game, the decisions you have to make, and the tensions it creates as the game progresses.

If I were to wrap up the game in one vague synopsis, I’d describe it being a game where you file paperwork and determine if someone is allowed to enter a country or not. That doesn’t sound very fun. You spend our days at work pushing paperwork around, not when playing a game that’s meant to immerse yourself in a different world for a couple of hours. The thing is, it’s so much more than that. You don’t just file paperwork, you must do it under a time limit, and because you’re timed, you’re also under pressure, and because you’re under pressure, you can make mistakes, and if you make one mistake, it can cause some serious consequences to you, your family, or to other citizens around you.

At the beginning of the game, paperwork is minimal, but as the game progresses, the amount of paperwork that needs to be combed over increases – and you really do have to look at each piece of information presented in front of you, because the game is smart – it may have the slightest error, which if you let slide, you’ll be punished for it.

However, as well as the main game itself, you also get a chance to play the Endless mode, where you don’t have any time limits, and you can choose what level of difficulty you wish to tackle, and it’ll remain at that level until you fail and the game is over. Even though you have unlimited time to scan through each individual piece of paper the citizens give you, there is still a high possibility of getting something wrong. A small curve ball which you completely missed – whether it’s a slight difference in the spelling of their name, or their height is off, or their weight isn’t the same, or you forget to forged seal at the top of the document – even when you are confident all their information is correct, you are nervous of that small ticket being printed from the bottom, detailing exactly what you got wrong. If you have gained enough points, you can survive losing 5 points on the first discrepancy, but the more you let slide through the net, those punishments goes up by a multiple of five.

There’s nothing worse when you’ve gained enough points, all you need is one more successful stamping to beat your record and so the pressure is on. You’re excited to finally beat your much earned record, and therefore your head is not in the same space it had been up to that point, and therefore you miss one vital piece of mismatching information, and your points sink faster than a brick in water, subsequently your shoulders slump and you sigh hard before vocally and confusingly shouting at the game, asking what the heck you got wrong as the ticket prints, detailing they had a different surname.

On the reverse of that, if you are able to remain in a level-headed realm just before crossing over into new point territory, and you slam that stamp down – you don’t want to sound too cocky, though, because as you are handing back their documents, suddenly the air becomes still and you wait for those stretched out seconds, watching the citizen leave the booth either to the right or left depending on if you’ve allowed them into the country – and you were correct. You can breathe once more, your shoulder slump but not with demotivation but in relief. You’ve beaten your record… and then you remember that the game continues until the points plummet into negative.

Willingly playing the hardest endless mode and managing to achieve a high sore, they must be insane with noticing details in other areas – probably a detective. I’d love to become an expert in the hardest endless mode of Papers, Please – process one citizen at incredible speed and with unflinching confidence, almost giving off the appearance as if I’m guessing and miraculously getting them right every time, but what I’m actually doing instead is scanning the documents at insane speed, noticing even the smallest incorrect details between any one document, raking in the highest score I’ve ever achieved in the game, and instantly make anyone who hears me say that score disbelieve it because in their eyes that score is impossible without making at least one mistake… but to get anywhere close would mean sinking hours I don’t have into the game.

Or maybe I don’t have to prove anything… after all, I did beat the last mission of Level 7 of The Simpsons Hit and Run twice; something some people haven’t even been able to do once – a crowning achievement in my gaming history.

Paper, Please is a game you can’t just load up and play – you almost have to be in a specific head space to mentally process the tension and the nerves which come with it – it’s not just a game, but an experience.

TV Show of the Week: Good Omens

I have to be honest here; I only started watching this show because it has David Tennant, who is one of my favourite actors. He nails every role he’s been in. Some might say his acting is over the top, but that just makes the character he’s playing jump off the screen so much more. I am also a fan of the writer, Neil Gaiman, who likes to focus on Gods, or indeed what we perceive as Gods. Good Omens isn’t a new book that was adapted, it came out in the 1990s and struggled to be adapted. It was at first planned to be a film, but that fell through. After many years later, a TV show was created, fronted by Neil Gaiman himself.

I went in completely blind, not knowing anything at all about the show, other than the fact it starred David Tennant and was written by Neil Gaiman. Last weekend I watched the entire 6-episode series almost in one go, only stopping to get some sleep as it was getting late and I was falling asleep in my chair. The next morning, after making myself some breakfast, I sat down and watched the final two episodes, and I absolutely enjoyed it all. I loved the humour, starting off with the two main characters who have the ability to do basically whatever they want, and have been on Earth ever since Adam and Eve were, Crowley and Aziraphale (played by David Tennant and Michael Sheen). David plays the demon and Michael plays the angel, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. When David is playing a character who likes to have fun, that’s when his acting is superb. During the flashback sequence in one of the episodes, we saw their lives throughout the thousands of years and whilst of course they had to remain inconspicuous to the public, you could clearly see both Michael and David having a blast with their characters, especially David.

The story throughout the six episodes is about the demon and the angel attempting to prevent the end of the world at the hands of the antichrist, Adam Young. The series saw a bunch of recognisable names, including David Morrissey, Johnny Vegas, and Andy Hamilton to name a few, each playing their characters with their own respectable vigour.

From what I can understand after seeing all six episodes, is (maybe) the reason for why it never was made into a film. With a film, you’re always going to have to condense the story down, whereas with a TV show, you have the opportunity to pad the story out further, and add bits and pieces which you simply could not in the film. The flashback sequence wouldn’t have been packed with as much detail about their lives together on Earth – but would have instead been just a couple of quick scenes. Don’t get me wrong, if Neil Gaiman was in charge of the script, I’m sure he’ll do his very best to make it work in the walls of a film, but the TV show allowed everyone involved to really get their teeth stuck into the source material and create a funny, energetic, celestial TV show.

I certainly recommend watching this and I wouldn’t at all be surprised if you found yourself watching it all in one sitting.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Mum's Monday: The Final Countdown

Could the attack on Pearl Harbour be prevented? With time travel, maybe.

The film starts as just another ordinary day on an air craft carrier, the USS Nimitz. Slowly it becomes apparent, something is not quite right. The film runs at a nice pace; it isn’t rushed that it becomes unrealistic.

The special effects are well done, if a little extreme. Afterwards it is good to see the attention to detail as to operations/how they work on an air craft carrier.

As far as the air craft carrier crew is concerned and apart from not really knowing what is going on or is happening, it is business as usual for the ship and the surrounding ocean.

The realisation of their situation slowly becomes apparent to the air craft carrier crew, although they are in denial the facts are there, which are described in the script really well.

It is lovely to see the dog rescued. With the unexpected introductions over, all are safe but are unfamiliar with the surrounding machinery.

This film shows that you cannot have a time travel film without the in-depth discussion on how it all works, or doesn’t work and how it can drive people crazy.

It is sad but true to real life that when someone is trying to help someone else it is not always obvious. In modern times things are done differently than in the past. It is inevitable things are not going to be understood.

In the circumstances there is only one question ‘What is going on?’ two things I can be sure of is that Senator Samuel Chapman (Charles Durning) wants some clothes and the dog has gone missing. Other than that it is a very confusing situation.

Another storm is forming, it seems history didn’t want to be changed, well not all of it anyway.  

Film of the Week: Godzilla – King of the Monsters

Godzilla has been rebooted, remade, and reimagined so many times – there has been 32 made by the Japanese studio Toho, 4 films made by other studios around the world, and 3 films made by Hollywood Productions, with a 4^th coming next year in 2020: Godzilla Vs. Kong. There have been 39 films made about Godzilla. If you take into account everything else, from TV to comic books, Godzilla is truly an iconic character, and there will always be new films about him over the next coming years.

With special effects practically a world away from what they when the first Godzilla film came out, the ability to make Godzilla and the rest of the monsters realistic-looking, is expected of us audience. But, the one thing that always comes with Godzilla is epic fight scenes. I don’t doubt that when the first Godzilla film came out, that was seen as an awesome spectacle, with ground-breaking fight sequences which warrant many re-watches. As special effects and computer effects have progressed on an outstanding rate over the years, those fight scenes are also getting bigger and better. When it was announced that the three headed beast, Ghidorah was to appear, we were eager to see them two clash on screen for the first time whilst in Hollywood’s hands. If no one was voicing it, we all were definitely thinking it – we expected it to be epic and grand before seeing it.

And boy, did it deliver. Critics have voiced their dislike toward the film, stating it has a poor story with many unoriginal elements, even stating that it doesn’t have enough time with the humans, but feature too much monster battles. First of all – that’s exactly what we wanted. Realistically, there are going to be humans in this film because it’s set on Earth. This is also a sequel, so we do see some emotional development from the battle that happened in the 2014 Godzilla. When the critics were saying we don’t see the humans enough, I was expecting them to make cameo-like appearances, but instead the entire film told through their eyes, and besides, why would you want to substitute epic imagery and fight sequences with more scenes with the humans. As far as I’m concerned, the reason why the storyline for the humans is looked down upon as weak and poorly written, is because it’s practically filler between Godzilla tearing Ghidorah apart with his bare claws, and he wouldn’t have been able to do that with the help of us humans, who, on a realistic note acted against Godzilla to begin with as they understandably thought him to be a threat not a saviour. It may be poorly written in the eyes of critics, but it’s necessary for the film to make somewhat sense.

To be honest, and this isn’t an actual criticism, I cannot remember the entire story the humans had anyway. When those fight sequences happened, I forgot everything and focused my full attention on absorbing as much of those frames as I could. When this film comes out on digital download, I will pause it at certain moments at extract them to be used as desktop backgrounds, because they deserve to be worshiped. There are so many truly epic imageries throughout, I was not at all bored with how much monster fighting there were.

Godzilla – King of the Monsters was superbly made with the right balance between monster and human, and certainly set a new standard with monster movies.

Thanks for reading

Antony Hudson

(TonyHadNouns)

Mum's Monday: The Longest Day

Thursday the sixth of June marks the 75-year anniversary of D Day. Although this film cannot capture the whole day hour by hour, this 3 hour plus film can portray the essence of what happened throughout the day and the lead up.

The start of the film, the lead up to D Day is well done, the attention to detail is very good. In amongst the horrors of war and bad weather, it is nice to see the script include an amusing part. I think the soldier should be allowed to write home to his wife, even if the baby isn’t his and the reaction of the other soldier is fun to watch as well, it helps to make and adds to the light-heartedness of the scene.

However, much it is lovely to win all that money, sadly money cannot buy your safety in a war. Also in a war it high-lights you should be careful who you lend your boots to.

When the Padre loses something it is nice to see he gets help to find it, in amongst all the chaos. The padre’s processions are very important to him above everything else.

With the large building on fire it sadly, looks like using the equipment of the day they were fighting a losing battle in putting the fire out.

The boats and troops have arrived on the beaches, again the attention to detail is well done for its day. We have seen in films made in modern times like ‘Saving Private Ryan’ a more detailed approach. In this film ‘The Longest Day’ these scenes seem shorter but work for what is being portrayed and within the confines of film making of the day when this was made.

It is lovely to see the Nuns taking care of the wounded, they put themselves at risk but there is a job to be done.

Despite an injured ankle Lt. Col. Benjamin Vandervoort (John Wayne) has a job to do, as foolhardy as it seems it is ultimately nice to see some compassion when he arrives in a town to find casualties still where they landed after parachuting out of the D Day planes.

The end of this film sums up the whole day and the hope that no shots would be taken. An injured soldier Flying Officer David Campbell (Richard Burton) with his leg safety pinned together. A German soldier with his shoes on the wrong feet, and the hope a soldier who hasn’t fired his gun all day, showing some positive on ‘The Longest Day’ out of ‘Dead, Crippled and Lost’.