Preamble

As mentioned in my previous blog post I'll be doing a sort of mini-review round-up of each month. Covering the movies, TV shows, books, games, music and live events that I've consumed. So, without further ado, cringe at my TV/Movie watching!

January is known for being one of the most depressing months of the year. The weather sucks, Christmas is over and we all return to work a little bit worse-for-wear (not to mention the colds going around!). Some people are doing Dry Jan, some are heading to the gym. I'm just trying to take my Vitamin D tab every day! Overall, January has been quite a fun month, eventful without being overloaded... I even managed to read a book!

Movies

For those with a keen eye you'll see that my movie watching is limited and sits somewhere around the levels of "excited child" and "angsty teenager". Enjoy the reviews

  • Sing!: A great movie to start the year with, beautiful animation, fun story and inspiring! Although, the incredible colour pallette was a bit too much for an NYE hangover. 7/10
  • Bee Movie: I'd actually never seen this before and had an idea of how weird it was but it honestly went further than I expected but had it's moments of humour. Strange film but enjoyable nonetheless. 3.5 Stars
  • The Croods: Nicolas Cage playing an animated caveman was what made me want to see what the hell this was. Good laughs and some truly fun slapstic comedy. 70%
  • Do Revenge: This Netflix teen-drama movie starts with a fun concept and questionable characters that are fully explained when the movie runs 30 minutes longer than it needs to into a fever dream of plot resolution. 70/100
  • To All the Boys I've Loved Before: This is the kind of movie I hate to admit I enjoy, corny, teen, romance. I had a great time watching it and enjoyed the general premise. 14/20

TV Shows

  • The Traitors: This new BBC reality/game show was an absolute blast. From the "Trapped for adults" vibe to beautiful Scottish scenery to Claudia Winkleman... I had a great time! One of those shows that's really fun to watch and think "what would I do in their shoes?".
  • The Circle (US) S1: Not realising that this was a recreation of a British show, I gave this a go and it was a really slow build. The concept itself is a lot of fun but it took longer than expected for any of the players were likeable. Ended up dropping this about 3 or 4 episodes in.
  • She-Ra and the Princesses of Power S1: This is the start of a rewatch of She-Ra, a funny, exciting, silly kids TV show with great morals and actual character depth and development. Love it! (And, if you'd like a more in depth review, check out my friend's blog over at Little Grey Cels)
  • Love Island 2023: I tried Love Island for the first time last year and enjoyed hate-watching it but, as these things go, I end up getting properly into it and loving the drama, corniness and downright confusing behaviours of those on the show.

Books

  • Occult London by Merlin Coverley: As part of the "New Year, New Me" hype I'm trying to get through a book a month. I tried to start reasonably by picking a fairly small book from my shelf. This book takes a historic/geographic/folktale approach to the history of London. Linking the landmarks of the capital to occult activities and strange events. By the end it ofers a great breakdown of places to visit and see if you ever wanted to do a sort of occult tour of London. An exciting and informing read!

Games

  • Rocket League: I will forever play this game, it is all I need, I love it. No further comments. This will likely be in my list every single month.
  • Noita: I picked up this game a couple of years ago and always come back to it for 10/15 minutes here or there. A randomly generated 2D dungeon crawler with so many different mechanics. It's lightweight and a lot of fun! Although I can't stop setting myself on fire.
  • Equilinox: Whilst looking to relax after an expectedly sweaty Rocket League ranked session I fired up this game I'd grabbed in some humble bundle or other. It's such an incredible peaceful, voxel, world-building game. Very relaxing and easy to get lost in evolving and growing things!

Music

ListenBrainz Stats for January 2023

While I desperately try to reduce my podcast addiction with returning to music I think these are some pretty good numbers. A few bits of reflection on my listening this month:

  • My DnB addiction continues to grow, the genre fits so well into both background music for work and high intensity Rocket League sessions. It doesn't really "appear" in the Top 10 stats as it's usually a playlist mix of many artists so that's where the hundreds of unaccounted for listens likely come from!
  • Casey made big numbers as I revisited their discography in preparation for seeing them live twice (see Live Events section and my updated bands list for the new additions)

Live Events

  • Hex: For the first time in probably a decade or longer I attended the theatre to see a musical. Hex is a reimagining of the story of Snow White with a fun sense of humour and silly characters. The songs are catchy and the overall experience of being in the theatre atmosphere was great to revisit!
  • Casey: With their return to making music together, post-hardcore band Casey announced a small tour around the UK. Having seen their farewell show a few years ago I desperately wanted to see them on their reunion show... A friend and I are both big fans of Casey but their London so sold out so quickly we were unable to get tickets. Through this we ended up getting tickets for the Bristol show (their opening night of the tour!) and also some tickets for London once a second date was added. Two nights with this wonderful band in 4 days was a treat and takes me up to having seen them 4 times.