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Yes, I’d agree with that, but the question is whether we count thematic trilogies defined as such by the director. If we didn’t accept the Cornetto Trilogy we couldn’t accept the Three Colours trilogy either, and I think I’d prefer to. They may not share characters or a world but they’re meant...

I think it depends what you mean, and the elements are setting and system. If the setting and campaign style (such as games based on TV dramas or Regency romances) are such that people don’t get into fights, then you won’t get into fights - but if there aren’t mechanics to do other things, then...

Ah, if only that ever worked in the U.K. public sector. I suppose I never tried blackmailing the Health Secretary.

This might be a more readable format for Tales from the Tables for some folk. Staying on webtoons for a moment, there is of course a metric ton of great comics there. The majority are Korean webtoons but there are plenty of other gems, such as The Weekly Roll (a funny D&D comic with a black and...

This has been a pretty heavy week for finishing books, for some reason. Just finished The Haves and the Have-Yachts by Evan Osnos, which is basically a collection of his articles from the New Yorker about, well, rich people. They're quite eclectic, varying from how much superyachts cost...

Just read Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan - it’s a short read (60 pages) but damn if it doesn’t hit right in the feels, like a distilled modern version of A Christmas Carol. The writing is incredible, low-key and gentle but fierce. It’s about the Magdalene laundries and I thoroughly...

Just finished Nobody’s Girl by Virginia Roberts Giuffre, a truly harrowing autobiography which goes into significant detail abouf her abuse at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell, Prince Andrew, and many others, as well as her long journey through depositions, lawsuits, online abuse...

I think it’s broadly accurate to say that a lot of English-language fantasy media created since 1930 or so has some elements of built-in romantic nostalgia. I think Tolkien’s main bits there are the clear nostalgia for the pre-WW1 England of his youth (the Shire) and maybe the whole “the true...

And even that (and some romance fiction) these days is leaning more into “do you know how many servants a Golden Age mystery country house had and how awful their lives were? Shall we talk about colonialism and why great white hunters aren’t a great archetype?” these days. Which is all to the good.

Jackson Lamb in the TV series is a darn sight better as a person and a character than he is in the books (at least the first four books which I’ve read). In the series, Lamb is uncouth and unpleasant but he also genuinely cares about his colleagues and tries to protect them. The Lamb of the...

It does seem that it’s very hard to predict what will do well at the box office (whatever the heck that actually means these days - the accounting always seems extremely opaque). There’s been a string of would-be blockbusters with reliable properties or stars not doing well in the last year or...

Did I not already do a thread about this? Could have sworn… anyway, I really enjoyed it, I think it’s the first piece of Transformers media I’ve thoroughly and unironically enjoyed since I was a child in the 80s. Absolute shout out to Brian Tyree Henry as D-15. He totally sells his journey from...

Captain America: First Avenger, Winter Soldier, Civil War. The third is probably the weakest and the second two films of course rely on the context of the rest of the MCU, but all three films are great, excellent superhero films. Kenneth Branagh’s Poirot: Murder on the Orient Express, Death on...

Now at 10 days without any streamer. Watching Tubi as well as Plex, and so have watched: The first ever episode of Mighty Morphing Power Rangers. Zordon really asked for teenagers with attitude. What an idiot. Mind you, after their first feckless fumblings, it's clear that Jason at least has...

Read and summarised this now and honestly it’s got great art but is otherwise lacklustre, with workmanlike conversions of the JRPG rules at best, but mostly duplicated 5E rules and spells. I actually think the Phantasy Hack might be a better game if you’re OK with the rules mostly covering only...

It’s the plan for when we all retire, isn’t it? The trick is all getting into the same care home and having most of our marbles when we get there.

There are definitely some board games that lend themselves to this more than others. Traitor games like Battlestar Galactica (“I’m getting suspicious of how much time President Starbuck* is spending in her Viper away from the rest of us, she must be a Cylon.”) but many others, such as Lords of...

Pittsburgh rare or medium rare; the first is preferred but not always offered. A friend of a friend ordered a thin steak well done recently. If I’d had a monocle it would have popped out, I can tell you. Of course, a gentleman never comments on another gentleman’s choices at the table.

Read Entitled by Andrew Lownie, which is a biography to date of the Duke and Duchess of York - or Andrew and Fergie, since they’ve recently been stripped of those titles. Lownie is an old hand at biographies of rogue royals, having covered Louis Mountbatten and Edward VIII - he’s said that he...

Have finished Radiant Black vol 1 now and I must say I’m impressed by the character writing in this and in Rogue Sun, which is considerably more realistic and yet somehow woven into the superhero narrative than is usually the case in comics. There are at least a couple of scenes which have...