Revisiting Stephen King’s Different Seasons
Apr26

Revisiting Stephen King’s Different Seasons

Revisiting Stephen King’s Different Seasons   Reading this collection of four excellent pieces in 2017 is a very different experience to having read it back in 1983, shortly after its initial publication. It’s not that my opinion of Stephen King has changed much; if anything, I appreciate him even more now than I did then.  Rather, in what is surely a unique case, three of the collection’s four stories were turned into films that are...

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Alan Moore’s Jerusalem
Apr12

Alan Moore’s Jerusalem

An Abattoir of Poppies: Alan Moore’s Jerusalem   “The last word that he said, it was Jerusalem.”   Yeah, I know what he means:  I thought it was going to be my last word an’ all. I seem to have been living with Alan Moore’s ‘million word magnum opus’ for more than three months, including a break to take a trip back home for my dear old mum’s 81st birthday. Do you remember that episode of Friends where Joey just has to get through all...

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Ghost in the Shell (2017)
Apr04

Ghost in the Shell (2017)

I Wasn’t Built for Dancing: Ghost in the Shell (2017)     Aside from buying a few issues of Lone Wolf and Cub back in the ‘80s, I know almost nothing about Manga comics and I know literally nothing about Ghost in the Shell, the Japanese comic book by Masamune Shirow, on which this film is based.  In fact, until yesterday I didn’t even know that there was a controversy over the casting of Scarlett Johansson in the lead role....

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