Close the World Open the nExt

What is it? Gundam One Year War OAV with some Vietnam vibes, a very good fight scene and not that great outside of that cool fight scene.

If You like Universal Century, Mecha, Cool fights

You may also like Mobile Suit Gundam 0083: Stardust Memory, Universal Century

I've now watched three Universal Century OAVs and uhhhh War in the Pocket is the only good one. I really wanted to like this one, but it's just not very good. Yes the Gouf Custom is a great fight and everyone should watch it, but overall don't feel like this had much going on.

Shiro isn't a good protagonist, the romance is very silly and there just isn't any thematic cohesion.

I'm watching all of Gundam in release order and maybe no one but Tomino should have worked on Universal Century.

2 Gouf Swords out of 5

What is it? John Locke from LOST murders his entire family then joins a new family under a new identity where his new stepdaughter is suspicious of him and people are closing in on his identity.

If You like Movies loosely based on real events, domestic horror, Terry O'Quinn, Terry O'Quinn's hog

You may also like Halloween, Cape Fear

Fun horror movie loosely based on real life murderer John List who murdered his entire family and then moved to join another family. Terry O'Quinn stars and does a great job as an increasingly unhinged Stepfather losing his grip on who he is currently pretending to be.

The wife and stepdaughter are both very well acted, but the b-plot involving people from his old life trying to find him is clumsy and the actors involved in this plot are just bad.

The soundtrack is a lot of fun as well, very of this era of horror synths, with some good off-kilter music during the climax and other moments of horror.

Terry O'Quinn's performance is great and I had a good time with the main story. His unhinged looks are appropriately creepy, and I also really enjoyed the focus on his character being obsessed with the "idea" of having a family.

4 family members out of 5.

What is it? Anime girls go camping, long shots of nature, talk about how to camp and the girls becoming friends. The protagonists are definitely gay.

If you like Slice of Life, Anime Scenery, Gay subtext, Relaxing music.

You may also like Azumanga Daioh, K-ON, Hidamari Sketch

Really enjoyed season 1 of Laid Back Camp and looking forward to watching the rest. I like being in the outdoors, though I am more of a "go back to a warm cabin at the end of the day" kind of person. It's fun seeing all the anime Japanese countryside and the characters have good chemistry.

The emphasis on Rin enjoying solo camping while the others are wanting to do larger group trips is nice, and I like that it stays an element with her being very into outdoors things and friends with all the members of the outdoors club, but not a member. She likes to do her own thing, but she does get closer with everyone especially Nadeshiko whos bubbly personality is a good balance for her. Also they are gay.

Music is really good too.

Really fun show, makes me want to go camping and watch season 2 to see all of the girls go on more camping trips.

▲▲▲▲ 4 tents out of 5

I'm a big Wheel of Time fan, it was the first big fantasy epic I read and—outside of Dresden Files or if you count all of the Cosmere books as one series—the only fantasy series of its length I've ever read. It has a lot of issues and the latter books by Jordan were not good and lost the plot a bit, he did start bringing it back home before his death and Brandon Sanderson helped finish it out well. Wheel of Time got me into fantasy and so I was excited to hear they were trying to make a TV show of it.

They did... okay. Which is a lot better than I expected. The first episode really should have been two episodes to give me more time to establish the characters and world a bit better. Like episode 1 should have ended with the trolloc attack arriving instead of them leaving town. I think the changes to Mat make sense to make him more sympathetic given whath appens in the first book. I still do not understand the Perrin wife thing, doesn't add much, would be better if it just wasn't there I think. The big change I am very unsure about is the mystery around the dragon reborn's identity. It makes Rand's character very flat in the entire season and the introduction of "the dragon could be a woman" really messes with the world.

I understand trying to undo some of the gender essentialism of the series and I think it's an admirable goal, but it just doesn't really work here. The series does a very job of establishing why men channeling is dangerous and why the dragon is dangerous to begin with. It takes a while to really show that and there needed to be more lay people terrified of the though of men channeling to get across why being the dragon would be so terrible. If they went with some of what happens later in the series with some more trangender characters channeling saidin despite being in a female body I could get it, but we see Egwene and Nynaeve channeling saidar throughout the season and it's still playing them up as potential dragons.

Still, I suppose they needed a throughline and The Eye of the World as a book is mostly setup for the world and the plot is a bit disjointed already, making it tough to adapt. I think the first few episodes are a bit weak, but it gets better and better as it goes on before nosediving towards the end, with the finale just being kind of dull and confusing even for me whose read the books.

Goods

• The Actors, I love most of the cast, sad they're going to recast Mat next season, but Moiraine and Nynaeve are so perfectly cast.
• Making Nynaeve and Lan's relationship better. De-aging Lan and actually having them flirt and such in book one will make that relationship flow much better
• The effects. I was very pleasantly surprised by how the effects looked. They did a good job with the weaves and the trollocs and faceless look pretty good.
• Loial. I love this character and the actor and effects are good, I always pictured him as a bit more monstrous in appearance though.
• The Tinkers. I think they handled the tinkers really well and I enjoyed their scenes.
• The Children of the Light. They did a very good job setting them up as antagonists and I enjoyed The Questioner's actor.
• Rand's Mom. I liked seeing her fight on the dragon mount, sets up the Aeial spear sisters as the great warriors they're supposed to be.
• The Seanchan designs. I think the masks is a cool way of just literally having collars and chains on women in the show.
• Loghaine. I liked the scenes with him and it adds a bit more to his character. I wonder if they'll consolidate him and Mazrim Tain for the show. Would make sense.
• Padahn Faine. Great actor for this and I enjoy the little hints of him throughout the season, though I think for the TV audience it would have been better to make it more explicit in a middle episode that he's near the characters at various times.

Bads

• Shadar Logoth changes. I don't love the changes they made here, the lore changes I'm ambivilent on given how much they'll need to streamline anyway, but I think there needed to be more focus on Mat's greed.
• The finale. Just weak, it feels really quick, arbitrary and uninteresting. I hated Egwene reviving Nynaeve. I didn't like the girls doing the lightning storm to take out the trollocs I get not having Rand be dramatically revealed yet, but again the season gives what little actions and character he can have to other people. He just doesn't get to do much and he needed at least a cool scene before the end.
• Perrin. I like Perrin in the books but I think they're doing him dirty in the show. The wife thing wasn't great and they don't setup the wolf powers enough in the show.
• Taverren. They barely explain what this is to the audience in the show. Feel like it needed a bit more focus early on.

Overall, I'm interested in future seasons. Past me would have been mad at changes, but like things have to be different for a TV show and I'm interested in seeing where this goes.

3 ages turning out of 5