Author: David Hogan

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days (Nintendo DS) Review

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It’s time for the next stop on my first play through of the Kingdom Hearts series, and it’s the DS game “358/2 Days”, pronounced “Three-Five-Eight Days over Two” which means really it should’ve been stylised “358 Days/2” but… whatever. Also I was following the main menu of the “Story So Far” PS4 game so played this next (by buying a physical copy! Who’d of thought I’d be buying a DS game in 2024…) then later found out it was released AFTER Kingdom Hearts 2 in order to fill in some gaps. Did it matter? No, in fact I really enjoyed myself here, seeing it as a sequel to Chain of Memories that fleshes out the Organisation plus sets up the prologue of KH2 to boot. I guess I’ll just have a different experience with the series than people who played it at the time! Let’s take a look anyway.

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Deadpool & Wolverine Review

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I’ve said on this blog a few times that I tend to steer away from flat-out comedies because what you find funny is extremely objective. Case and point, while I enjoyed the first Deadpool film I found the second one leaned too heavily in the more crass humour that I don’t really enjoy, but I wouldn’t feel right reviewing it and giving it a low score because it might be right up someone’s alley, unlike more traditional storytelling issues which I feel more comfortable pointing out. Deadpool & Wolverine though is a “canon” entry in the MCU, and I really don’t want to miss one of the films out, so here we are! Thankfully for me the film doesn’t go down the crass route this time and lands some pretty good gags while keeping things gory and verbally explicit. Let’s take a look!

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Doctor Who: Dominant Species Review

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I remember years ago John Dorney said in an interview that he was practically begging to do a story with the Dominators and that he was “serious” when people thought he was joking. I was intrigued, especially as Mr. Dorney is probably my favourite writer in the Big Finish stable, and finally: here we are, and you know what? It’s an extremely predictable and by-the-numbers “resistance group fighting against invading aliens” story. Huh? Mr. Dorney could’ve written this exact story with any number of other alien races, why did this prove the Dominators “needed” a second go around? Oh well… At least the Fourth Doctor / Naomi / Harry stories are over now, it hasn’t been a great run. Let’s take a look!

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One Piece – Egghead Arc (Episodes 1086 – 1122) Review

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Here I was waiting around for a good break to do the first batch of Egghead Arc reviews and One Piece only goes and stops entirely! … sort of. Yes, after Episode 1122 fresh One Piece anime episodes are on a break until April, a new re-edited version of the Fishman Island arc airing instead (given I just covered the original earlier in the year, I won’t be covering that on this site…) So what better way to find a break in the story than use the break in the story! Let’s take a look at the first chunk of episodes from the first arc of the “Final Saga”, shall we?

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Doctor Who: The Face in the Storm Review

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Next up in the Fourth Doctor / Harry / Naomi run of stories is “The Face in the Storm”, where Big Finish go back to the “person meets their relative in the past and can’t risk damaging their own future” trope, complete with a tragic storyline for good measure. I mean, at least it isn’t Helen this time, I guess! Let’s take a look…

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Anime UK News: Halloween 2024 – A Look at Wicked City

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I don’t normally post the join “look at this season / review this season” articles we do at Anime UK News as it tends just to be a paragraph or two on stuff I’ll end up reviewing fully any way, but for Halloween this year we all picked something to cover for one article and I picked the old “classic” Wicked City… sufice it to say I doubt I’ll be giving it a proper full review any time soon, so if you want a couple of paragraphs of my thoughts on the film, plus some great picks from other staff members, click HERE.

Happy Halloween! … Remember that year I had enough free time that I reviewed all the Hammer Horror Draculas in a row? *Sigh*… those were the days!

Doctor Who: The Trials of a Time Lord Review

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“The Trials of a Time Lord” is the latest in a run of overly-long boxsets where to celebrate a milestone since a Doctor’s first TV appearance Big Finish decided to throw literally everything into a blender and see what happens, and once again it’s just not very good. It’s thankfully better than the Seventh Doctor’s “Last Day” duo but that’s damning with faint praise if I’ve ever heard it. Featuring the Cybermen, Davros, Daleks, Androgums (yes, Androgums!) and The Master, with a plot that’s basically just Vengeance on Varos again it could have been a fun ride in expert hands, maybe, but instead it’s just a “remember him?/them?” fest with little going for it… So, let’s take a closer look! Yay?

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Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero (PS5) Review

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Sparking! Zero has finally arrived after months of hype thanks to a great marketing effort and my own nostalgia for the Budokai Tenkaichi series this is a sequel to, and I’m relieved to tell you the game lived up to that hype, and then some! It goes without saying that if you want a more serious, competitive fighter then this isn’t the game for you, but if you want a fun Dragon Ball game then you can’t get much better. Let’s take a look!

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End of Evangelion Review

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It’s time to, well, bring an end to my look at the original Evangelion series with the big film finale, not that it was ever actually planned to exist (Hideaki Anno was happy with the more… unconventional ending of the TV series) and frankly that shows. While it has the visual spectacle and great soundtrack you’d expect from the series it also doubles-down on the more downbeat aspects of the series, especially putting poor Shinji through the wringer, as if Anno said “You want a different ending?! Well here: have THIS!” and projected how unhappy he was onto his own characters (he apparently tried to take his own life at one point, so… yeah.) It makes for interesting, if uncomfortable viewing, but does it make for good viewing?

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