Video Game, Board Game, Comic Book & Movie Reviews – and more!
When I first started Mid-Life Gamer Geek back in the now utopian beforetimes of *checks notes* 2019, my intention was to continue writing about gaming; video games, board games and perhaps tabletop RPGs here and there too. I didn’t have the confidence to branch out into other areas at first and believed that I lacked the knowledge and insight to […]
At one stage in Bordello of Blood, which feels like an episode of the fondly remembered 90s TV show stretched out to an interminable length (though the main feature minus framing device and credits isn’t much longer than an hour), Dennis Miller’s apparently ‘witty’ private detective character says “I feel like I’m in a bad Tales from the Crypt episode”. […]
October heralds the start of Spooky Season – and I’ve already gone way out of my comfort zone to get into the spirit of Halloween by watching the demented Mandy, a film which shares its producers and star – Nicolas Cage – with Color Out of Space. An adaptation of an HP Lovecraft story, Color Out of Space marks the […]
Keeping to the wrestling theme started with yesterday’s review of comic book Invasion From Planet Wrestletopia, I figured it was way past time that I finally covered Barry Blaustein’s brilliant 1999 documentary going behind the scenes of professional wrestling, Beyond the Mat. It’s a remarkable film that covers an awful lot of ground, from amateur hopefuls looking to get their […]
You can often judge a Nicolas Cage movie purely on the basis of how frequent and intense his freakout scenes are – as well as how well they fit with the tone of the film in general. In that sense – as well as in many others – Mandy is an unqualified success. It’s a pretty extreme film from a […]
I distinctly remember missing the broadcast of the very first episode of He-Man and the Masters of the Universe in the UK; I was out playing with friends while it was on and we were all extremely jealous of the talk in the playground the next day, having not been able to witness what we were told was an absolutely […]
There are few finished films that have as infamous a genesis as the 1996 version of The Island of Dr. Moreau. It’s truly the stuff of legend; a young director on his way up the ladder from low budget exploitation fare who’s clearly out of his depth (who’s fired a week into filming and then manages to sneak back on […]
There are countless tales of movies that never quite saw the light of day; absolutely fascinating stories of seemingly cursed productions where nothing goes right and everything goes down in flames before getting a chance to reach the big screen. Sci-fi is a genre in particular that seems to see more than its fair share of doomed projects, likely because […]
The first time I properly sat and read an issue of 2000AD was in the early 80s. I was with my Dad, visiting one of his mates; his son was older than me and had a copy of the latest prog (that’s ‘issue’ in 2000AD lingo) on the coffee table. I was bored as the adults chatted and started to […]
Based on the early 90s Japanese manga strip Ganmu – translated into English as Battle Angel Alita – and the 1993 animé (also known in English as Battle Angel Alita), this James Cameron-produced, Robert Rodriguez-directed film was originally announced way back in 2003, with Cameron set to direct. However, with James Cameron now seemingly invested in directing nothing but the […]
It was a very different time for superhero movies in the late 90s/early 00s. As is often the case with Hollywood, the failure of one specific movie was seen as the death knell for the entire genre – in this case, Batman & Robin was the harbinger of the apocalypse for superhero movies. Rather than concentrate on the fact that […]
At first glance, Scoob! seems like it’s going to be an origin story for our favourite scaredy-dog and his mystery solving friends. Yet it soon becomes clear that it’s a shameless, awkward and somewhat cynical attempt to set up a shared universe featuring the classic Hanna-Barbera characters from the 60s and 70s. It all starts off nicely, with a young […]
The risk of making huge budget movies can sometimes be a gamble worthy of beloved Corellian chancer Han Solo himself. However, there were – until recently – not many franchises more set for success than Star Wars, so a prequel movie covering the early years of Han Solo was seen as the closest thing there is in Hollywood to a […]
I’ve long been a fan of the gorgeous animated movies from Studio Ghibli; often tales infused with a sort of magical realism, their tales are most often set in real world environments, with supernatural or fantastical elements that put it the story just one step away from reality. Whisper of the Heart is a little different; though it does feature […]
After the critical and commercial failure of the William Shatner-directed Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, there was concern that the series – at least from the point of view of the movies starring the original cast – had run its course. On TV, the Star Trek series was thriving of course, with The Next Generation approximately halfway through its […]
Following the ‘Spock Trilogy’ of movies (beginning with Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, continuing with Star Trek III: The Search for Spock and ending with Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home), the status quo of Star Trek had been reset somewhat, story-wise. With Kirk demoted to Captain, back in charge of the Enterprise with his regular crew, it’s […]
