C. J. Hopkins, an American playwright residing in Berlin, writes a column of political commentary which appears in various places on the Internet. I encountered his work on unz.com, a rogue site which publishes writers from all over the spectrum, many of whom have been banned and censored elsewhere. I enjoy Hopkins’ maverick viewpoint and […]
I approached this Netflix streaming movie with trepidation. Recently this network funded a live-action adaptation of the classic manga/anime Death Note that drew the ire of fans, myself included. I sincerely hoped this wouldn’t be another proverbial train wreck. I was pleasantly surprised to see that it wasn’t. The Fullmetal Alchemist movie (see my review […]
Matt Groening, creator of The Simpsons, is one of those people who can get the public’s attention simply by announcing a new project. His Futurama quickly became a cult classic and as for The Simpsons, there’s hardly a place on the planet where they haven’t heard of Homer and Bart. So Disenchantment, his new medieval […]
While attending a movie recently, I was astonished to see a trailer for an upcoming steampunk movie, Mortal Engines. I had heard of the 2001 book by Philip Reeve but hadn’t read it. The premise was very imaginative albeit somewhat silly: in a post-apocalyptic world, cities went mobile to survive. They became huge steam-powered edifices […]
In the early 1980’s, renowned sci-fi writer Jerry Pournelle compiled the first in a series of story collections with a military theme. For several years they came out regularly until the end of the Cold War seemed to make the series obsolete. Though I hadn’t been interested at the time, my interests have broadened since […]
Flowers of Evil (Aku no Hana) is a 2013 animated series from the studio Zexcs based on a manga by Shuzo Oshimi with a screenplay by Aki Itami. Though Arlys and I are big anime fans, this is not the kind of show we usually watch. It features middle school students with no powers or […]
Being a steampunk fanatic, anything with “clockwork” in the title automatically piques my interest. The book’s cover illustration of a colorful harlequin-like character added to my fascination. Clockwork Ninja turned out not to be steampunk, but rather an imaginative urban fantasy set mostly in my hometown of Phoenix, Arizona. Full disclosure: I know the author, […]
