As kids, my sisters and I were obsessed with any film, TV show or book about animals. Anything that personified animals was perfect. It’s something that hasn’t really left me as I got older, which is why I was so excited to see this in the charity shop. Personified rabbits who are tasked with looking after the Queen? I’m not exactly pro-Royal but that sounded like a lot of fun. I had to buy it and I couldn’t wait to read it. But would it really be as good as it sounded?
Do you remember a few weeks ago when Matt Damon tried to tell us that leading men were no longer a thing? Meaning that audiences only care about franchises and not who is in a film. Of course, what he was actually saying is that audiences don’t care when he’s in a film any more. After all, there is plenty of evidence that goes against what he’s saying. The star of today’s film is more than enough evidence to the contrary. Deadpool wasn’t a success because it’s a comic book movie. That didn’t hurt it, obviously, but it wasn’t the reason for the success. Ryan Reynolds played a huge part in making that film everything that it became. In fact, I’d say that Ryan Reynolds is one of the biggest and most consistent draw for film audiences. It’s no wonder it’s been doing so well since its release.
I never read Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events when I was younger. I remember seeing it in bookshops all the time but I never picked it up. Even when the film adaptation came out, I wasn’t really bothered by it. It wasn’t until I watched the Netflix series that I was interested in reading the books. The show was so well made and so much fun. So, I started thinking about reading the series. Of course, as my TBR is currently huge, I didn’t actually do anything about it. Not until I needed to cross off a couple of letters on my February Spell the Month Challenge. I knew that I’d be able to get the first 2 books finished in time and get the letter B and an R sorted before the month ended. It seems to make sense that I review these together, so consider this the first in Motherbooker’s A Series of Unfortified Reviews. Disclaimer, you’ll probably forget them in no time.
I almost didn’t have anything to review today. For some reason, I never got around to watching a film this weekend. I guess I just spent too long trying to get through that bloody Murder, She Wrote book. I didn’t realise until Monday that I’d forgotten. So, I had the choice to write something else for today or watch something and review it in the same night. I had thought about weighing in on the Johnny Depp/Fantastic Beasts news but I didn’t know if that would go against my ban of the writer who must not be named. In the end, I picked the quickest new release on Netflix that I could find. I didn’t know anything about it but someone I follow on Instagram had watched it recently. What did I have to lose?
I miss going out to the cinema. The news that Cineworld would be closing due to Covid has made me realise just how long it been since I was las sat in a cinema. I obviously hope that cinemas will survive but it seems clear that, post-Coronavirus, the way people watch films is going to change. I’d love to be able to go out and support my local cinema but I just don’t want to take the risk. I’m not officially shielding but as a “high risk” individual in a virus hotspot, it really doesn’t seem worth the risk to sit in a room full of strangers for a few hours. No matter how good Tenet might be. And it’s not fair to place the survival of a whole industry on individuals anyway. But I digress. For the time being, there are plenty of films being released on Netflix at the moment to keep me occupied. It won’t ever be the same but it’s something.
After my last read, I had every intention of reading a proper book but I also needed to write a second book post this week. Of course, when I say “proper book”, I don’t mean to suggest that children’s books aren’t proper but that they aren’t exactly age appropriate. It has been nice revisiting my youth again though. This was another book in this series that I’d already read and it was probably the first time that I’d seen the dark and gory side to fairy tales. I was probably more aware of the Disney version where everyone lives happily ever after. It will no doubt have rocked my world to discover the disgusting origins to these well known stories. But does it still live up to my memories?
Yipee ki-yay, motherbooker 