Author Archives: Mark

Red Dwarf Series 4 A great outing for the crew of Red Dwarf, maintaining the feet they found in series 3, and containing some wonderful sci-fi ideas as well as excellent gags. It consists of 6 episodes: ‘Camille’, ’DNA’, ’Justice’,  … Continue reading →

An Idiot Abroad – Series 1 and 2 This show is about the travels of Karl Pilkington, a long-time colleague of the comedy writers/performers Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant.  Karl is rather close-minded, glum and always seems to find the … Continue reading →

Game of Thrones This is an excellent 10-part drama about the intrigues, violence and everything else you’d expect in a clearly adult drama series set in fictional kingdoms that bear than more than a passing resemblance to Tolkein’s middle earth … Continue reading →

The Grinch (2000) Made in 2000 and directed by Ron Howard but mostly dismissed somewhat by critics and held up in many circles to be a bit of a Christmas turkey, this is, in my opinion, a most excellent and … Continue reading →

I am Spock by Leonard Nimoy This is a memoir by Nimoy which zooms through his involvement with the TV series (but gives enough to be interesting) and then more exhaustively covers his involvement with the 6 star trek movies … Continue reading →

Ronin An interesting work by Miller predating his more famous works (such as The Dark Knight Returns, Sin City and 300), and hailed by some as his first masterpiece, I was definitely engaged for the first half of book one … Continue reading →

Rather over-extended story (spanning 7 episodes) about Marco Polo encountering the Tardis crew and taking their ‘flying caravan’ as a gift for the Kublai Khan.  This was a really-drawn-out, wordy story, that meandered about for much of its running time, … Continue reading →

Beneath the Planet of the Apes Okay, this starts with 5 minutes from the end of the first movie, after which we see Charlton Heston as Taylor disappear into a landscape, leaving his non-talking companion Nova alone on a horse … Continue reading →

Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett This is the third book by Pratchett about Discworld, and involves no characters from the previous books – and as such the reader can read this one as a standalone without being disadvantaged. It involves … Continue reading →

The 40 year-old virgin The film wasn’t that funny or particularly engaging for the first 10 or so minutes, the characters seemed flat, and there weren’t many laughs. It warmed up a bit during a poker game, where a little … Continue reading →

Batman: Year One This 2011 animated movie is adapted quite directly from a graphic novel of the same name.  It’s a rather good origin story, plotting the course of two men arriving in Gotham – Bruce Wayne after years of … Continue reading →

Trilogy of Terror (1975) This is a made-for-TV anthology horror movie consists of three stories.  Each story is about a specific woman or women, and each central character is played by the same actress, Karen Black.  She’s actually quite a … Continue reading →