Before the deluge of September releases hit, I needed to squeeze in some time to return to a smaller game that had intrigued me earlier this year. TR-49 is the latest entry from Inkle Studios, best known for narrative-based games like 80 Days, Heaven's Vault and Overboard. It has a similar narrative focus but with some puzzle elements mixed in. As a game, it is not perfect. But as a work of interactive fiction it is amazing.

The main premise revolves around a strange WWII-era computer that holds 100 years worth of human knowledge via books, documents, notes and other records. The machine, you are told, has been scrambled and your task is to search through it and try to rebuild the connections, simultaneously learning the story of the people who built it and what its purpose is. Meanwhile you are talking to someone named Liam, who is guiding you but also suspiciously withholding certain information.

The machine catalogues material using 4 digit codes: two letters and two numbers. You can type in any 4 digit code and go directly to a document or you can follow links embedded in some documents. Part of the puzzle is finding which codes are actually valid but from there you also need to assign the correct title to each one as well. This relies on a lot of deductive reasoning based on dates, years and names of authors and it plays a bit like Her Story and The Roottrees are Dead. However, there are some meta elements that start working their way into the investigation including log entries from other users, codes to trigger the machine's higher functions, and even a little text adventure-style mini-game.

When I originally started TR-49, I had played about 2 hours or so and put it down. Returning to it a few months later it was initially difficult to pick up the threads and figure out where I left off. Fortunately, the game does keep notes for you and it also gives some indication of which entries still have undiscovered links. There are some important techniques that I didn't fully understand and start to use until the latter half of the game, including the concept of author indexes and how to reveal log entries. To be fair, the game is only about 4 or 5 hours long so it is probably much better to binge it over a short period of time.

It's interesting in that the majority of what you are doing in this game is just reading and looking for clues that might lead you to the next document or author. There were a few moments where I felt stuck and unfortunately due to the nature of the game it's difficult to look up hints. A lot of the walkthroughs you will find online just have a full list of all of the codes in the game, which kind of ruins the fun. I wish there was a slightly better hint system in the game.

I should mention that there is some decent voice acting for the present day dialogue, which at times adds some urgency to your work. For the most part, you can still choose when to engage in these conversations. You can also skim a lot of the documents for keywords and clues without fully investing in the narrative if that is your preference. The only problem with this approach is that you will not fully appreciate everything it is doing... especially since the whole game revolves around the power of words to create and change reality. There is definitely some commentary on A.I. here but that is not the only thing this game has on its mind.

By the end, I was all in on the story and wanting to know where it was going. I really enjoyed it and thought there was a cool atmosphere carrying it along and a lot of fascinating ideas explored. Still, I have to admit that after doing some additional reading, there is a lot more to the story that I didn't catch. Perhaps I was doing too much skimming or maybe I was too focused on the puzzle elements to fully absorb everything. But it's a very cool concept and clearly you get out of it what you put into it. Highly recommended for fans of deductive puzzles and cerebral science-fiction.

Toronto International Film Festival tickets officially go on sale for non-members on Monday (or today if you are a VISA Infinite cardholder!) and I've been browsing the schedule so I thought I would put together a quick list of some of this year's noteworthy movies. My days of going all in on TIFF are far behind me but I'll probably still try to check out a movie or two. That being said, this year's line-up seems somewhat underwhelming. I'm not sure if that's just the state of the industry or if other festivals are stealing the biggest premieres or what the deal is. Let me know if there is anything you are looking forward to this year!

Alpha Gang (dir. David and Nathan Zellner)

The Zellner Brothers directed Sasquatch Sunset a couple of years ago, the odd and amusing dialogue-free movie about a Bigfoot family in the wild. Now they are back with an alien invasion comedy that looks like another strange study of humanity. The movie stars Lea Seydoux, Dave Bautista, Lily-Rose Depp and Cate Blanchett.

Anchors Aweigh (dir. Matt Barats)

I don't really know anything about alt-comedian Matt Barats but I've heard him compared to Nathan Fielder and John Wilson due to his deadpan delivery. This is his second feature film and it finds him proposing to his girlfriend only to be rejected and sent spiralling on a neurotic journey of self-reflection.

Babies (dir. Lauren Miller Rogen)

Lauren Miller Rogen teams up with her husband and Anna Kendrick for a comedy that explores the pros and cons of having kids. It revolves around a couple who are undecided about having children who decide to take in a friend and her toddler after a divorce. Lauren and Seth have famously chosen to live a child-free life so it will be interesting to see how this perspective shapes the story (and the laughs).

Bucking Fastard (dir. Werner Herzog)

Werner Herzog is back with his first fiction feature since 2019's Family Romance LLC although in this case it is loosely based on a true story. Bucking Fastard stars Rooney and Kate Mara as twin siblings who fall in love with the same man. Their love turns into an obsession and eventually prompts him to take them to court, leading to a full on media frenzy.

Club Kid (dir. Jordan Firstman)

One of the more buzzed about movies of the festival, Club Kid is written and directed by Jordan Firstman (I Love LA) and he plays a New York club promoter who is blindsided by the discovery that he has a 10-year-old son. His hard-partying lifestyle is upended, hilarity ensues and some emotional lessons are learned (I'm guessing).

The Debut (dir. Jesse Eisenberg)

After A Real Pain, Jesse Eisenberg has definitely become a director to watch and his latest is probably one of the highest profile films at the festival. The Debut stars Julianne Moore as a bored housewife who is inspired to join a community theatre and comes to the attention of a director (played by Paul Giamatti) who takes the production a little too seriously.

Everest: The Other Side (dir. Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi)

The latest documentary from the duo who made Free Solo, this one follows Jim Morrison and Hilaree Nelson, a couple pursuing their dream of skiiing down the side of Mount Everest. Shot in IMAX.

Fjord (dir. Cristian Mungiu)

Romanian director Cristian Mungiu is well-known for films like 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days but this is his first movie with some big international stars. Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve play a Christian couple who move to Norway with their children and set off a chain of controversies building to a tense courtroom drama. Possibly this year’s Anatomy of a Fall?

Hope (dir. Na Hong-jin)

The latest genre thrill ride from Korean director Na Hong-jin (The Wailing), looks to be a small-town mystery and intense monster movie. It only has one screening at the festival unfortunately, I think because technically it releases in select theatres that same week.

Ink (dir. Danny Boyle)

Danny Boyle is back at TIFF with his latest film based on the true story of The Sun, the wildly successful British tabloid newspaper. Guy Pearce plays Rupert Murdoch while Jack O'Connell plays The Sun editor Larry Lamb. (This one also arrives on Netflix in December.)

Look Back (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda)

Hirokazu Kore-eda directs a live-action adaptation of the acclaimed manga and anime about a shy aspiring artist who finds success after an unexpected creative collaboration. Although this might seem like a redundant remake, I'm interested to see what Kore-eda does with the story, particularly its darker turns.

Rogue Trooper (dir. Duncan Jones)

Duncan Jones returns to the director's chair after his divisive sci-fi film Mute for an adaptation of the classic British sci-fi comic strip Rogue Trooper. It looks a bit trashy and garish but I think that is intended and I am hoping that will end up being part of the fun.

A few others worth mentioning:

• The Face of Horror (dir. Anna Biller)

• Misty Green (dir. Chris Rock)

• Musk (dir. Alex Gibney)

• Neil Peart: No One’s Disciple (dir. Sam Dunn and Scot McFadyen)

• Possible Love (dir. Lee Chang-dong)

• The Stunt Driver (dir. Michael Dowse)

• A Talent for Murder (dir. Anton Corbijn)

• Wild Horse Nine (dir. Martin McDonagh)

Five years have passed since the events of Resident Evil: Apocalypse, but somehow it feels like a whole lot more. The setting has shifted from a single zombie-ravaged city to an all out desert wasteland. How did this happen? We are told that after the Umbrella Corporation dropped a nuke on Raccoon City, the T-Virus continued to spread worldwide and wiped out plant and animal life everywhere leading to a barren landscape. It feels like a pretty big jump but to be fair the movie does take place in Nevada, which is basically a desert already. (Do we know where Raccoon City is? My research indicates it is supposed to be in the midwest but a specific state is never mentioned.)

Resident Evil: Extinction is the only live-action RE movie I know for sure I had seen previously (aside from Welcome to Raccoon City which was fairly recent), and I think at the time it was this drastic change in setting and the Mad Max / Terminator 2 vibe that got me interested in it. It was also directed by Russell Mulcahy, who had a decent resume of genre movies under his belt including Highlander. I saw it at the drive-in at the time but I remembered very little else about it. Rewatching it now, it has a few cool moments and visuals but it still doesn't really stand out above the rest. It just isn't as much fun as it should be.

Some of the crew from the previous movie has returned, but not all of them. Alice ended the last movie having been rescued by Carlos, Jill, L.J. and Angela. Mike Epps is back as L.J. although he is not quite the same wise-cracking joker he was previously (I guess the zombie apocalypse eventually breaks everyone down). Carlos also returns but Jill Valentine is unaccounted for and so is Angela. Instead we get our first appearance of Claire Redfield (played by Ali Larter) and Ashanti has now joined the cast as Nurse Betty. There is a whole convoy of survivors under Claire's command and the movie partially revolves around their goal of getting to the safe haven of Alaska, which they believe to be uninfected. One minor character is named Kmart because she was found in a Kmart store. Kmart sucks.

Iconic Resident Evil villain Albert Wesker also makes his live-action debut here (portrayed by Jason O'Mara) but he doesn't do a whole lot in the movie. Why do they keep adding characters from the games only to give them very little purpose or personality? I suppose it's just the minimum amount of effort required to keep fans interested. I should note that although he didn't direct, Paul W.S. Anderson did return to write the script and he is clearly unwilling to shift the focus away from the established protagonist Alice. He was engaged to Milla Jovovich by this point and they were expecting their first child together, which may or may not have been a factor.

Despite the presence of Wesker, it is Iain Glen who becomes the primary villain as Dr. Isaacs. Since turning Alice loose at the end of the last movie, he had been desperately trying to clone her without success. When he finally relocates her, he sends out his new enhanced zombies to bring her back in. Failing that, he tries to shut her down remotely, which is apparently a thing he can do.  Ultimately he becomes a "Tyrant" after getting bitten by a zombie and injecting himself with an overdose of the antivirus. He does have tentacles, unlike Nemesis in the previous film, but he meets his fate in the laser corridor which is recycled from the first movie. I guess people really liked that laser corridor, huh?

We learn that Alice's blood can cure the T-virus, which is why Isaacs had been cloning her and trying to recapture her. So why did he set her loose at the end of the last movie again? Wouldn't he have had a sample of her blood from the previous times they had captured her and experimented on her? I know I shouldn't ask questions. I suppose the spread of the virus wasn't fully expected at the time. Meanwhile Alice just keeps getting more and more powerful with her ridiculous telekinetic powers and by the end of the movie she now has an army of clones at her disposal as well. You would think with Alice being almost unstoppable they would try to build up the other characters so that we care about some of the mere mortals. I suppose they do try to give Carlos an emotional sendoff of sorts, but this is only after he is already infected.

Once again, if you can turn off your brain, there are at least a few fun action sequences particularly with Alice wielding dual blades in slow motion wearing that sweet western longcoat. There is still some frustrating rapid fire editing here and there, but at least some of the ugly stylistic choices like the step processing have been abandoned. There is a decent homage to Hitchcock's The Birds as the convoy gets attacked by a CG flock of zombified crows at one point (and yes, those damn crows are in the games). The idea of a post-apocalyptic Vegas is pretty cool although they don't do all that much with it aside from a Planet of the Apes Statue of Liberty reference. I wonder if this could have been an inspiration for the video game Fallout: New Vegas, which came out a couple of years later?

One minor note that many people have pointed out: there is some weird digital airbrushing going on with Milla Jovovich's face in this movie. My initial thought was that this was related to the clones somehow and that it was done to indicate that they were "freshly made" but I believe the original Alice also looks weirdly shiny at times. It is implied at various points that she is genetically perfect so perhaps that is the reasoning behind it? Who knows. Maybe Milla Jovovich just had some scratches that needed to be covered up. She did a lot of her own stunts, after all.

The score by Charlie Clouser of Nine Inch Nails fame is actually decent and I prefer it to the Marilyn Manson score in the first movie although I realize I may be in the minority. It still has a slight industrial / nu-metal feel to keep some continuity with previous films but it has a bit more atmosphere as well. He also scored the Saw franchise although I can't remember much about the music in those movies. (I have only seen the first two and the Chris Rock one... it may be the next series I need to subject myself to.)

When it comes to the Resident Evil movies, people tend to see what they want to see. Some people seem to think the series gets progressively better while others insist that it gets progressively worse. So far they aren't changing all that much for me, just getting slightly better or worse in different ways while remaining mostly mediocre. Anyway, that's all for now... bring on Afterlife in 3D baby!

Note: This post is dedicated to the memory of Lloyd Jefferson "L.J." Wade who was taken from this franchise far too soon.

When the dust settles, it seems a safe bet that 2026 is going to be remembered as the year when Gen Z took matters into their own hands. The next generation of filmmakers are making their presence felt in the movie industry this year and at a time when a lot of the previously reliable Hollywood fixtures are faltering. Alongside Curry Barker and Kane Parsons, we now have another new voice to add to the mix: It Ends director Alexander Ullom.

These directors are easily associated by the fact that horror is their genre of choice and they are bringing to bear influences from newer mediums like video games and the internet. The common thread among many of these films is a fascination with and fear of liminal spaces. On that point, It Ends has more in common with Backrooms and Exit 8 than Obsession, leading people to nickname it "Backroads" or "Backwoods". Regardless of what label you want to throw at it, it is a pretty effective thriller that does a lot with a little.

Four friends jump in a car and embark on a late night road trip without a clearly stated destination, joking and catching up with each other as they drive. They head deeper into a wooded area and find that their path is suddenly blocked by trees, leading to an argument over whether they missed a turn along the way. Then things get weird: a crazed horde of people suddenly swarm the car and attack them, forcing them to jump back in the vehicle and make a hasty escape. From there, they find themselves lost on a strange, endless road where the car never runs out of gas and they never need to stop for food or water.

Although it is being marketed as a horror movie, It Ends is more existential and psychological than it is visceral. It is also darkly comedic at times. The friends bicker and banter and deploy various coping mechanisms as the scenario progresses. They get into inane debates over whether various animals would win in a fight and exchange memes to lighten the mood. Each character also starts to reveal their own insecurities and flaws whether it be a tendency to self-sabotage relationships or even an attempted suicide. The four friends seem to capture a deliberately chosen cross-section of Gen Z concerns and personalities.

Dialogue makes up a big part of the movie but there are still some solid bits of tension and intrigue as they attempt to explore the limits of this mysterious forest. However, even as the movie progresses, much of what they experience remains ambiguous. This is always a tricky thing to navigate, particularly with a smaller indie movie. Is the story better off staying vague or is it a convenient way to limit the budget and scope? I think the movie works on its own terms but I did find myself wishing for a little more plot and moments of urgency along the way.

The idea of using a car as the primary location for what is essentially a single-location film is pretty creative and not something that has been done all that often (Locke being the only other one that immediately comes to mind). There is also something very potent about the metaphor of being trapped in a car on an endless road. Ullom has stated that for him the movie represents the issues facing recent graduates as they look to start adulthood, staring down the lack of opportunities and endless treadmill of life. That being said, I'm sure there are many other interpretations out there; I kept thinking about doomscrolling on social media and the inability to escape that feeling of anxiety and dread.

It Ends originally premiered last year at SXSW and after failing to find a distributor it debuted on Letterboxd Video Store later in the year. It was this opportunity that brought it to the attention of Neon, who have now given it the theatrical release it deserves. It feels like a very Gen Z twist that it ultimately needed to circumvent the standard distribution system in order to find an audience. If you think you can handle a little more uneasiness and existential dread in your life, It Ends offers some catharsis and does a lot more than coast on its killer concept.

In case you weren’t aware, Jay has been posting a treasure trove of old movies over on his Patreon for a while now, most of which were made when he was a teenager with a lot of talent and boundless creative energy. If you’re a long-time Film Junk listener, you might see at least a few familiar faces in them. I was lucky enough to become friends with Jay right around this time and to get to take part in many of his projects. We met through his cousin Jeff, who I had played hockey with, when we were all invited to join a Dungeons & Dragons campaign. How's that for an origin story?

In those days we would often get together and hang out with our group of friends with no real plans but inevitably something creative would somehow end up happening by the end of the night. We didn’t drink or go to parties… in other words, we were huge nerds and, well, boredom breeds creativity. My house was kind of the default hangout location. We'd play Mario Kart and listen to music in my basement and people would gradually show up throughout the night.

Anyway, we were bored at my house one summer night and we were hunting through a random assortment of objects in my basement when suddenly inspiration struck. We found something... to this day I still don't know what it is. A white faux fur hood? A liner for a jacket? A head cover for a carpet cleaner? Whatever the hell it was, I put it on my head and it looked like a big white afro. We just started laughing and we knew we had something. We added a mask and hockey shoulder pads and Albinoman was born.

I wasn't much of an actor and certainly had no real aspirations to become one but I could at least remember a few lines at a time and (mostly) keep a straight face while delivering them, which was useful. I want to say that is primarily why I ended up playing Albinoman but the truth is, pretty much everyone ended up in front of the camera eventually except for Jay himself. The overall vibe was infectious and people were usually more than willing to get involved. Jay handled most all of the technical stuff himself, Rebel without a Crew-style.

We made the first movie that night, which was more like a 10 or 15 minute short. The impact of Tim Burton's Batman was still huge at the time, both on us and on pop culture in general. I think this must have been 1995 because one of the jokes in the first movie was a reference to the "I'll get drive-thru" line in Batman Forever. Or maybe that was in one of the follow-ups? I guess maybe in our minds Albinoman started as a parody of those films but it kind of became its own thing from there. The Tick animated series was also airing around this time and it became a big influence.

After the first few instalments, we decided to get really ambitious and tackle our first proper "feature-length" movie: Albinoman: The Motion Picture. Jay had written a script and we actually went out to real locations to shoot it. Shorthills Provincial Park was used as a substitute for the Amazon rainforest. Sunset Beach in St. Catharines was used as a nuclear testing site in New Mexico. It was a big step up in terms of effort and we may have even spent some money on props and costumes.

The most memorable scene for me, however, has got to be the chase scene that took place just down the street from my house. It was memorable for reasons outside of what happens in the movie itself. My brother and Chian were playing thugs that had been hired to kill Albinoman and broke into his house. Albinoman manages to sneak out the back door and jumps on a bike to try to escape as they give chase in a car. My brother was leaning out of the passenger window and pointing a toy machine gun at me.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, several police cars came flying around the corner and surrounded us with lights flashing and sirens blaring. "Step out of the vehicle and put your hands on the roof!" One of my neighbours had seen us making the movie and decided to call the cops. Supposedly they thought there was a real drive-by shooting happening. At the time, I found that hard to believe and I always wondered if they were just trying to ruin our fun. Then again, we did have some elderly neighbours so I suppose anything is possible.

My mom had a police scanner at the time and listened to it regularly so imagine her surprise when she heard that there was a potential threat on our street. And soon after that they were taking down all of our names and relaying them back to the dispatcher. I remember one of the cops was a real dick and wanted to break our toy gun. He kept calling Chian "Wheels" because he was the driver of the car. Pretty cool nickname, although it never really stuck. Jay did manage to get some brief covert video footage of the police on the scene. I never did find out which neighbour made the call.

Albinoman: The Motion Picture premiered at Laura Secord Secondary School, which is where Jay and several of the cast members attended high school. We also had a website called IndySent Productions where we sold VHS tapes of the movie and traded them with other independent "no budget" filmmakers. We would go on to do a few more Albinoman projects together including a TV pilot created when Jay was at Niagara College (previously posted on Art Brut as well) which was even pitched as a real series to The Comedy Network in Canada. My brother and I later made an Albinoman comic book (now available as a free bonus download with Garden City Vol. 2).

The full movie is now available as a free post over on Jay's Patreon and we recorded a brand new audio commentary track to go along with it. So go check it out! As ridiculous as it is, I feel like it was an important movie for Jay in terms of taking his filmmaking a little more seriously. For the rest of us, it was just a lot of fun to be involved and I think most of that fun still shines through in the final product. If you're lucky, you may get to see some of Albinoman's other adventures in the near future as well!

Happy belated Texas Chain Saw Day! The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is the latest movie to be unofficially granted its own annual "holiday" for promotional purposes. In this case, August 18th just happens to be the day on which the events of the film supposedly took place. They had screenings of the original 1974 film in theatres earlier this week and we were thinking of going but ultimately just decided to throw it on at home instead. What could be more suitable for Family Movie Night than a movie about family?

We had been talking about watching this one for a while. Kieran wanted to continue to explore some Dead by Daylight lore because Leatherface is a playable character in the game (he knows him as Bubba) and hanging victims on hooks is one of the main mechanics. However, the movie also has a certain reputation which was appealing for him but also a little daunting. We weren't sure if it was going to be too extreme. I know a lot of people say that the majority of the violence is offscreen, which is kind of true, at least in terms of blood. But the movie is disturbing in other ways too.

Alicia has memories of seeing TCM at a birthday party when she was 10 years old, which was clearly way too young. Kieran is turning 15 this year and has seen enough horror stuff that I felt pretty confident he would be fine. (I should note that Maisie would probably not be fine but she had opted out anyway.) That being said, early on Kieran was squirming when they pick up the hitchhiker and he cuts himself using Franklin's knife. Self-harm was not something he was very comfortable with and the initial tension of having such an unpredictable person in the van definitely got to him.

As the movie progressed, we were joking about how quickly Leatherface dispatches his first 3 victims. I had told Kieran ahead of time that the movie was pretty short. "I can see why this movie is only 83 minutes," he said. It serves to establish Leatherface as extremely dangerous and I think the quick kills actually feel more realistic and unsettling. Only giving brief glimpses of him also builds the mystery and terror in your mind. The pace changes in the second half as it builds to essentially one long chase sequence with more sustained tension.

Kieran commented on the set design of the house and how it is weird, dirty and off-putting. I tried to convey that the overall look of the film achieves a similar vibe because it was shot on 16mm. However, I'm not sure it actually had that effect on him since he lacked the internal context built up to interpret that aesthetic as feeling more realistic or dangerous. The overall cinematography just looked old to him (along with the '70s fashions and hairstyles), which if anything, kind of pulled him out of the movie a bit.

The question of whether an older movie can truly scare a younger viewer came up. I mean, I think the answer is obviously yes but perhaps there are more barriers to overcome. Kieran struggled to think of an older horror movie that had really scared him out of the ones he has seen so far. On the other hand, he hasn't seen very many recent ones so it's tough to compare. He believes that horror video games are scarier than movies and although that is probably somewhat subjective (and depends on the game) it did make me wonder if games have helped him build up a certain level of tolerance.

But how do you even measure a movie’s scariness? Maybe these movies aren't giving him nightmares (at least I hope they aren't) but this one clearly got under his skin to some degree. Jump scares are another common measure of the "fright factor" and they are somewhat involuntary. There are some decent jump scares in this movie, particularly when Leatherface jumps out of the darkness and kills Franklin (although how he kept that chainsaw quiet I'll never know). Kieran claimed that this didn't affect him although I suspect if we had been in a dark theatre it would have been a different story.

I still think the main reason this movie is generally considered so scary is because it just feels… real. It is framed as being based on a true story, and even when you know it's not, there is nothing supernatural about it and it remains within the realm of believability (being loosely inspired by real-life serial killer Ed Gein). The villains are simply mentally unwell. However, we did inform Kieran during the opening narration that it wasn't actually a true story, which maybe did the film a bit of a disservice. The subtle score and straight up lack of music at points also makes it feel less like a "movie", which is something that Kieran picked up on.

It was interesting watching this so soon after Evil Dead II because, like that movie, it also gets very chaotic at points and has a dark sense of humour. The dinner scene is the piece de resistance, of course. Sally is clearly on the verge of losing her mind; meanwhile, Leatherface is trying to get the grandfather to use the hammer to kill her and he keeps dropping it, which somehow manages to be bizarre, hilarious and terrifying all at once. This definitely evoked some laughter and there was some earlier laughter at some of the bad decisions characters make throughout the film. (And of course, Franklin "crashing out" and blowing raspberries when his friends leave him behind.)

Overall, Kieran said he liked The Texas Chain Saw Massacre a lot more than he expected for such an old movie. I'm not sure why he was surprised; he liked Halloween a lot too and it's only a few years older than that. When pressed on what exactly he liked he said it was just entertaining (Capital E entertaining?). I think the humour landed for him but I also think there is something about having an iconic horror movie villain with a unique look and personality that he really enjoys. Even in a movie like this, it communicates to the viewer that we are in a fictional world and relatively safe space playing by at least some of the established conventions of the genre. At the time, Leatherface was probably not necessarily intended to be that, but that's the magic of horror movies and the enduring nature of this one in particular. There is a certain "je ne sais quoi" that elevates it from random scenes of meaningless murder and torture to a carefully constructed thrill ride you can't wait to go on again.

Is every video game equally deserving of preservation? Game preservation is a big topic of conversation these days, especially now that Sony has announced that they will be ending physical game releases in 2028. Naturally, everyone wants to make sure that the games they love will continue to be playable for the foreseeable future and for generations to come. But what about the games they hate? Who will fight the good fight in the name of absolute trash?

A couple of years ago, Limited Run Games decided to step up and bring one of the worst games of all time to modern consoles with Plumbers Don't Wear Ties: Definitive Edition. I knew the legend of this game but didn't really know the specifics. When I spotted it on sale for a pretty cheap price one day, my curiosity got the better of me. How bad could it be? I needed to find out for the sake of science, but I hadn't fired it up until just recently when I realized it might make a good entry for this column. I now regret my decision.

When people talk about the worst movies ever made, the movies that inevitably enter the conversation are usually weird and inept, but still quite often entertaining in their own right. Obviously it is a very subjective thing but their biggest sins are that they will offend you, annoy you or just put you to sleep. The worst video games, however, are potentially much worse. They are usually borderline broken and torturous to play. I'm thinking of games like E.T. and Superman 64, which are a few of the ones that come up the most often.

Plumbers Don't Wear Ties actually manages to do all of the above. Released in 1994 for the 3DO, it is described as an adult-oriented choice-based full-motion video game. Except there is no actual FMV and very few choices. So what you actually experience when "playing" this game is long stretches of still images (pixellated photographs, which can alternately be viewed with HD upscaling in the Definitive Edition) accompanied by absolutely atrocious voice acting, the most basic library sound effects and terrible stock music in an attempt to tell a slightly humourous story. Every 10 to 15 minutes you get to make a choice and then you sit and watch for another extended period of time. I was kind of hoping for something akin to a Leisure Suit Larry but those games are absolute masterpieces in comparison.

This is much more like watching a bad movie. The problem is that you're only seeing a slideshow of awful still images (La Jetee this ain't) and the few choices that you do make inevitably lead to a "game over" scenario and force you to start over back at an earlier chapter. There is no way to guess which choice is right or wrong, you just have to power through it via trial and error. It is painful, not to mention misogynistic and borderline offensive at times.

The story, if you can call it that, revolves around two hot young Los Angeles residents named John and Jane (played by Edward J. Foster and Jeanne Basone) who are being hassled by their family to finally meet someone nice and settle down. Your goal is to guide them towards hooking up, which might have been engaging if there was any skill or strategy required to accomplish this whatsoever. The only thing that *might* give someone a reason to keep playing (particularly back in 1994) is the fact that it flaunts the possibility of nudity every so often. Don't get too excited though; as far as I can tell, this nudity is always censored. The original game supposedly had a cheat code to unlock full nudity but from what I have read the Definitive Version does not.

The original game came out at a time when a lot of video games were trying to push the envelope with sex and violence in order to sell copies. Night Trap had caused a huge fuss just a couple of years earlier and led to the creation of the ESRB. I guess they thought that a little bit of smut combined with the CD-ROM's multimedia capabilities were all they needed for a massive hit. How wrong they were.

The Definitive Edition includes a bunch of behind the scenes interviews and supplementary material, which does at least give a bit of that historical context. In order to unlock some of these videos, you'll have to play a new game mode called Plumbing the Depths where you explore a first-person maze and shoot Jane's boss with a plunger whenever he shows up. It's not great, but at least there is some level of interactivity there. The game was mainly rediscovered in recent years thanks to the Angry Video Game Nerd himself, James Rolfe, and he makes an appearance in the extras along with several game critics and the producers of this new version. Jeanne Basone also does some interviews and a full audio commentary. Unfortunately, writer / director Michael Anderson is completely absent... dude's got some explaining to do.

Is Plumbers Don't Wear Ties one of the worst games of all time? It is undoubtedly one of the worst things I have ever played, but a big part of that is due to the fact that it offers very little gameplay or interaction at all. The story and audio / visual style are also completely repellant, leaving little to no redeeming qualities to speak of. I do not recommend buying it, playing it or even really watching videos of it. Could there be others out there that are just as bad, if not worse? Probably. And yet, I suppose Plumbers Don't Wear Ties deserves to be preserved if for no other reason than to guarantee that humanity never, ever attempts to make something like this again. It needs to be remembered just to serve as a reminder that it really should have stayed forgotten.

It's time for another in-house update from Space Junk HQ. We're getting close to the end of the summer here and I am pretty much ready for the cooler weather to arrive. Although to be honest this summer wasn't quite as hot and humid here in the Niagara Region as it usually is. I didn't get much reading done and I didn't finish many games either aside from 007 First Light. I was hoping to have a few more things crossed off my list before the September floodgates open. I guess technically I still have a couple of weeks left so I should make them count.

Or maybe I just need to chill out and enjoy what's left of the summer.

I feel like I have been cranking out a decent amount of writing here (maybe too much?) but I'd like to find a way to mix in some shorter form stuff. I was thinking about using Notes to post interesting links here and there but the problem is that they will only go to "followers" and not "subscribers", which is annoying. I'm still trying to resist using Substack as a social media app. Maybe I'll just do some collected posts of links and news stories instead.

I've noticed some new subscribers popping up whenever I post movie reviews on Letterboxd (hello!) so I wanted to try and find an equivalent for video games. I have used GG.app for a while now but it seems kind of dead. From what I can see, Backloggd is the current frontrunner in terms of active users. Anyone out there using it? Anyone have any other recommendations? The only thing that sucks is they don't have an app yet.

I have been playing around with our new 3D printer a little bit (Bambu Lab A1) and so far I have printed some hand grips for my Retroid Pocket 5, a cable organizer and an Alien Xenomorph figure. (These are all models someone else created, of course, I did not make them from scratch.) The Xenomorph was kind of a pain, it kept breaking during printing because the supports weren't good enough. I have learned how to auto-generate supports but that still doesn't guarantee success. Anyway, now I'm out of ideas. What else do people use 3D printers for? If we get D&D going with our gaming group soon maybe I'll use it to print off some miniatures for that.

Here's what's on the Space Junk docket for the next little while:

• Strange Artifacts: Plumbers Don't Wear Ties (aka one of the worst games of all time)

• Family Movie Night: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (it's all about family!)

• The Making of Albinoman: The Motion Picture (HUGE collab with Art Brut Films)

• A list of the TIFF 2026 movies that I am interested in

• RE Watch: Resident Evil: Apocalypse (aka the one I've seen before)

• My History with Video Games Part 4

• new Garden City Podcast

I have some ideas for other continuing series I would like to do but only if Resident Evil doesn't kill me first.

How are you all doing? Can I get you anything? Let me know.

A few years ago, when we released the first issue / volume of Garden City, my brother and I recorded a podcast talking about how we made it and some of our influences and inspirations. I didn't really have a permanent place to host it at the time but I thought I would repost it here for anyone who missed it. So here it is:

The Making of Garden City Vol. 1

We'll be recording a follow-up for volume 2 but I wanted to give folks a chance to ask some questions if they have any. I know not everyone reading this is necessarily into comics but I’m sure we’ll also be discussing music and our memories of the ‘90s among other things. So if you have something you want us to answer, just post it in the comments or email it to filmjunk@gmail.com.

Note: I have not set up a separate podcast feed for Space Junk yet although it is something I am thinking about for the future.

For better or worse (definitely worse), I am now fully committed to watching all of the live-action Resident Evil movies. Although the first one immediately threatened to destroy all of my enthusiasm for this little project, I am pushing through. The world needs to know the truth about the second most successful movie franchise based on a video game series.

From what I can tell, opinions on Resident Evil: Apocalypse are somewhat varied. Don't get me wrong: no one is calling it a masterpiece, but some fans seem to think it is at least one of the better entries in the series. On the other hand, Rotten Tomatoes says it is the worst of the bunch and Roger Ebert called it "an utterly meaningless waste of time." He was also convinced that video games could not be art so I suppose that tracks. Dude, this is definitely art.

Although I do not yet have the context of the full series, I think I actually enjoyed Apocalypse more than its predecessor. It's not great but it is getting a little closer to what I had always imagined this series was all about. There is more over the top action and it seems to be embracing the campiness of the Resident Evil games. It is also pulling more directly from the source material even if it is a bit distorted and only half-recognizable... a mutation, if you will.

Paul W.S. Anderson was not able to direct because he was working on Alien vs. Predator so he handed it off to a guy named Alexander Witt. Witt is a prolific second unit director who has worked on such movies as Speed, Gladiator, The Bourne Identity and several James Bond movies. He clearly knows blockbuster action movies and Apocalypse continues to push the franchise in that direction. Some of the action is pretty fun, but unfortunately it also uses a lot of rapid fire editing combined with the blurry step printing style of the era that sometimes makes it hard to tell what is happening.

We finally get our first appearance from a major video game character here with Sienna Guillory playing Jill Valentine, although she feels a bit redundant and is constantly being upstaged by Milla Jovovich's Alice. One amusing example is when she tosses a lit matchbook over her shoulder to set some zombies on fire (in slow motion of course) only for it to accidentally go out before it hits the ground. Alice shows up a moment later out of nowhere, smoking a cigarette, and casually flicks it onto the zombies to save her. Nice try, Jill. Jill's outfit is based on her look in Resident Evil 3 (tube top and skirt, no beret) which ends up feeling more like Lara Croft than a police officer. Chris Redfield is not present, I guess because he was not in that game, but we do get versions of lesser-known characters Carlos and Nicholai.

Apocalypse is mostly inspired by Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, which was teased at the end of the first movie. Nemesis himself is brought to life almost entirely with practical effects and looks pretty good in my opinion. In the games, Nemesis is a mutated supersoldier / superweapon and the same holds true here. However, it turns out Alice has also been experimented on and is something of a supersoldier herself. Umbrella has essentially turned both of them loose and pitted them against each other to see what happens. But they didn't count on the fact that Alice would eventually realize that Nemesis is actually her old friend Matt. It's kind of funny how they make that realization so emotional when he was so damn forgettable in the first movie.

Jared Harris has a supporting role in the movie as Dr. Charles Ashford, the creator of the T-Virus. He doesn't exist in the games and so they rewrite the virus origin story here, explaining that he created the virus with good intentions while trying to find a cure for his daughter Angela's genetic condition. His daughter gets trapped in Raccoon City so he offers Alice and her crew safe passage in exchange for saving her. This adds a vague Escape from New York vibe to the proceedings, which I kinda liked.

Resident Evil: Apocalypse was shot in Toronto and the surrounding area (I believe at least one other entry was shot here as well). Ironically, a viral outbreak threatened to shut down production when SARS hit Toronto in 2003. Toronto City Hall makes a very prominent appearance towards the end of the movie with Alice literally running down the side of the building before it eventually gets blown up real good. (Err... sanitized.) There is a decent action sequence that takes place at the Hamilton Cemetery as well.

I can't wrap up a discussion of this movie without mentioning one of its unsung heroes: Mike Epps. He provides some brief moments of comic relief in a movie that otherwise takes itself pretty seriously. Epps plays a guy named L.J. who was being arrested at the Raccoon City police station but then ends up escaping and tagging along with the S.T.A.R.S. folks. He has some great / terrible lines including yelling "GTA motherfucker!" while running over zombies with a car. I read an interesting theory that he is supposed to be a tribute to Dewey, a character that got cut from the first Resident Evil game who was inspired by Axel Foley.

The movie ends with Alice waking up in a lab yet again and then escaping using her newfound telekinetic powers. Sure, why not? With Alice becoming as powerful as she does, I can see it's going to get a lot harder to maintain any real sense of horror moving forward. The next movie is one that I actually have seen before, although I remember very little about it. Let's stay positive and continue this upward trajectory. In the immortal words of L.J., "You motherfuckers are crazy! Look at that big motherfucker, got a rocket launcher!"

If you're like me and you miss the early 2000s heyday of quirky character-driven documentary films, you'll be happy to hear that these do still exist. They're just a little harder to find nowadays. Alysa Nahmias' Cookie Queens is a charming little doc that feels like a throwback to the days of Spellbound and Mad Hot Ballroom. It revolves around the long-standing tradition and surprisingly lucrative business of selling Girl Scout cookies.

Contrary to what you might expect, this is not a competition doc -- at least not in the traditional sense. The film follows four girls as they set their own personal sales goals for cookie season and, with the help of their families, try their best to reach them. The goals all vary in terms of ambition but along the way, there are many interesting questions raised. What lessons are they learning from this experience? Are the parents pushing their kids too hard? Is this all just a child labour scam allowing Girl Scouts of the USA to rake in hundreds of millions of dollars?

One of the girls we meet, Olive, has previously set a record of over 8,745 boxes sold in North Carolina. She wants to beat that record but she is also starting to question where all the money is going. Only $1 out of the $6 per sale currently goes to her troop while the rest goes to the Girl Scouts organization as a whole. Meanwhile in El Paso, TX, Shannon Elizabeth's family is feeling the pressure to sell all of the boxes after potentially biting off more than they can chew. (No, you generally cannot return unsold boxes of cookies if you fail to sell them.) Despite the cute and cheerful surface, there is a darker side to this business and the doc addresses this without getting too heavy handed.

On the other hand, the girls are all very relatable and inspiring. Five-year-old Ara is the youngest of the girls and is tackling the smallest amount of cookies but she is adorable. She has type-1 diabetes and wonders why they don't offer a sugar-free option. Meanwhile, nine-year-old Nikki has two older sisters that were previous cookie sales champions in Chino, CA, and she desperately hopes she can follow in their footsteps. There are plenty of funny and heartwarming moments as the girls slowly come into their own.

I have to admit, I didn't totally understand how some of the huge sales numbers were being racked up in the movie. We see some of the girls utilizing social media to get the word out but I assume you can't sell that many cookies simply by setting up outside a grocery store. There is also some mention of various rewards for cookies sales including a "cookie camp" and trips overseas. I felt a little confused about how these worked and what kind of sales numbers are needed to receive them.

Overall, the style is very observational and the cinematography is quite beautiful at times. Some upbeat music provided by Kathleen Hanna's The Julie Ruin and several others gives the movie a hopeful girl power angle. I had a lot of fun with this one and it feels like a real crowd pleaser that is fully suitable for viewers of all ages.

Meghan Markle is listed as an executive producer on the film, which I'm guessing is one of the reasons it was able to secure a theatrical release - a rarity for docs in this day and age. Aside from Girls State, I can't think of too many other documentaries like this to come out recently. But regardless, I'm glad this one managed to claw its way through the system. Cookie Queens is a sugary sweet delight that's more than just empty calories and it is worth seeking out if it is playing anywhere near you.

Do we know who came up with the term “friendslop”? Do we at least know if they now regret it? I sure hope so. At this point I think it's safe to say it's not doing anyone any favours. Up until now it has been used to describe a certain type of indie co-op game that is popular with streamers where the visuals may be a little basic and the controls a little janky but they result in wacky emergent fun. Games like Peak, R.E.P.O., Content Warning and Lethal Company have had huge success but also seem to be looked down upon... probably thanks to the "slop" part of the term, which is not entirely fair.

Let me just clear this up now: I've got nothing against friendslop, but Big Walk is not friendslop. The latest release from House House, the folks behind Untitled Goose Game, is a co-op specific open world puzzle game. I won't say it's completely jank-free and the game does have a cute aesthetic and a playful tone, so I understand the comparisons to some degree. It also makes use of proximity chat, which is often a key feature of those other games. But it is going for something pretty different.

After playing a few hours of Big Walk, the games I would compare it to most are The Witness, Myst and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. (Okay, maybe a bit of Peak too.) You and up to 12 (!) friends control strange little cartoony bird-like creatures who traverse an otherwise photorealistic island. As you explore, you will come across colourful little structures that contain puzzles. As these puzzles are solved you will earn a thing (I’m still not sure what the official term for these things are) which can be combined with others to unlock a new area of the island and a new set of puzzles. This is the basic structure of the game but there are even more secrets to be discovered along the way.

The puzzles themselves are not really that difficult, at least not from what I've seen so far. They do require collaboration and many of the puzzles scale based on how many players you have. But most of the game's challenge (and the majority of the time spent) involves navigating the world and communicating with your friends. The space between the structures is pretty massive and there aren't a lot of ways to travel quickly between them (at least not initially). You will be doing a lot of walking and a lot of talking and you almost certainly will get lost and separated from your friends at points.

There is no map that I have found in game so far (although you can find one online if you really need it). There is also a day and night cycle and once it gets dark it becomes very hard to navigate, especially if you are not carrying a light source. You can only carry one item per person at a time and if you fall you might drop what you are carrying and have it roll away down a hill. When someone gets out of range of the proximity chat, you can only use a walkie talkie or a signal flare to communicate.

That is why, despite the glowing reviews, I am getting the sense that Big Walk may not be for everyone. It does require some patience and an interest in solving puzzles. It also requires friends. Very little is explained to you and I'm not quite sure yet if there is a story, even a minimal one. There is a lot of down time in between puzzles. Don’t get me wrong: there is still room for some friendslop-style antics. You can slide down the side of a mountain or throw your friend off a cliff. But expect to be doing a lot of walking and talking.

If you think this sounds frustrating or stressful, you’re not wrong… but these limitations are also a key part of the experience. The end result is a game that truly does feel like you are out there exploring the unknown. The dense vegetation and mountainous terrain hide each of the puzzle areas very well and when you find a new point of interest or figure out how to reach it, the sense of discovery is immense. As with Breath of the Wild, Skyrim or some of the best open world games, it feels like you can spend hours simply wandering. But unlike those games, you won't be doing it alone.

After a small delay, I am happy to announce that the second issue of Garden City is now up for sale over at Payhip! We had to make a last minute change when we realized that Gumroad suddenly stopped supporting physical products. We decided to switch over to Payhip so that we can still offer both digital and print editions of Garden City in a convenient way.

If you purchased Garden City digitally over at Gumroad, you should still have access to it. If anyone wants us to offer the digital version of issue #2 over at Gumroad for the sake of consistency, let us know. But the fees are actually more expensive over at Gumroad anyway so we'd prefer to stay at Payhip moving forward.

The good thing is that Payhip also allows us to do combined shipping so if anyone wants to order the physical edition of both issue #1 and #2, you won't have to pay twice the shipping costs. Also just a reminder that if you purchase the digital version of issue #2, you will get a bonus copy of Albinoman: The White-Haired Avenger as well!

Here is the plot synopsis for Vol. 2:

Your fave 1995 slackers and hackers return as the misadventure continues. Taylor and Jer just wanted to hang out and see some local bands play but the night had other plans for them. After they narrowly escape a fight at the local 7-11, Taylor crosses paths with his mystery date and things get even weirder from there.

Look for a bonus podcast about the making of this issue and some of the related local lore in the near future. Thank you for your interest in our little indie comic. Byeeeeeeee.

After experiencing some ups and downs with video games throughout the '90s, by the time Y2K hit I was back into games in a big way. I was also starting to focus in on the game industry as a potential career path while finishing up university. Technically the sixth console generation started in the late '90s with the Sega Dreamcast but it wasn't around for very long. For me, the next generation started with the Nintendo GameCube but I did finally start to get out of my Nintendo comfort zone as the decade went on. Let's discuss, shall we?

GameCube

In the early 2000s, I still had not been won over by Sony yet. I had a few friends who were hardcore PS2 heads and I was starting to contemplate getting one but when the GameCube and Xbox launched I had a big decision to make. Grand Theft Auto III was huge at the time and I really wanted to play it but I also knew Metroid Prime was coming out in the near future. I remember reading on some random forum that a GTA III port was in the works for the GameCube (which obviously turned out not to be true) and that was the only push I really needed to stick with my beloved Nintendo.

Looking back at the list of GameCube launch titles now, I can't remember buying too many of them. I think I had Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 to start and I bought Eternal Darkness when that came out (I had to support the local talent, of course, and then maybe figure out how to land a job at Silicon Knights). By the time Metroid Prime released in November 2002, I was feeling like my purchase was fully justified. If I'm being honest though, some of the other Nintendo first party titles that came after that disappointed me, like Super Mario Sunshine and even The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker at the time. Resident Evil 4 and Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance come to mind as other GameCube games I loved.

Game Boy Advance SP

I did not own an original Game Boy Advance but I seem to remember downloading an emulator and checking out some of the early GBA games that way. When they released the SP a few years later, I was sold based on the backlight and the foldable form factor. What's interesting to me is that at this point in time, video games were still all about pushing the most realistic graphics possible, particularly now in 3D, and the GBA didn't seem all that cool by comparison. But once I started playing some GBA games I realized that 2D gaming was alive and well and they were still iterating on well-worn genres in exciting new ways.

The Castlevania games really hooked me at the time, particularly Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow. As much I loved Metroid Prime, I started to realize that Metroidvanias were still at their best in 2D. Metroid Fusion and Zero Mission, The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, WarioWare Inc: Mega Micro Games, Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, Advance Wars and Final Fantasy Tactics are all games I remember enjoying a great deal. I also played through Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles (okay so I did beat another Final Fantasy game) with a few people at Silicon Knights using the stupid GBA / GameCube link cable. What a pain that was.

Xbox

By now I had actually started working at Silicon Knights and I was living the dream. Video games were everywhere around me at all times. You could walk around the office at SK and there would always be some new game that had just come out that other people would be playing. I ended up buying a lot of games during this period of time just because everything looked so cool but I did not have as much time to play them because I was working long hours on and off.

A lot of AAA games were coming out on both Xbox and PS2 but not GameCube because it wasn't powerful enough (or if it was powerful enough, it was still the inferior version). So I knew I was going to have to invest in another console and around this time Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic had just been released. That was probably the thing that pushed me to buy an Xbox. (I'm really not sure what I had against Sony at this time... I think they just never had that one must-play exclusive game that pulled me in.)

I was also excited to play Halo and the GTA III / Vice City two-pack came out for Xbox later that year too. I remember the hype for Halo 2 and the excitement of going to a midnight launch for the game (I'm sure it wasn't the first to do it but they became a lot more common after that). This was also when I joined Xbox Live and had my first online gaming experiences with a console. Microsoft felt like they were innovating in a lot of ways and they were really embracing their "outsider" status in the industry at the time.

Nintendo DS

Nintendo unveiled the DS at E3 2004 and I remember being somewhat puzzled by it at the time. They claimed that it was not an official successor to the GBA (although it did end up basically being that) and it seemed like such a strange idea. Why would we ever need two screens? But in classic Nintendo fashion they ended up delivering something new and unique and they put out a lot of cool games that made use of the hardware.

I did not buy this system at launch, probably because I was somewhat skeptical but eventually I was won over. The real killer feature for the DS was the addition of a touch screen. That being said, sometimes they went overboard with it (I still haven't finished either of the Zelda DS games because of the forced touch controls... I need to try out the d-pad mods one of these days). The Igavania games continued to be great on this system and Nintendo rediscovered the joy of 2D Mario with New Super Mario Bros. I did upgrade to a DSi years later so I could get into the downnloadable DSiware games but there weren't a ton of standout titles.

PlayStation 2

My first Sony console! I finally caved and bought a PS2 close to the end of its life cycle. I believe God of War was the game that got me to pull the trigger but Guitar Hero soon became a huge factor as well. I had already played a lot of the bigger multiplatform games on Xbox so I was mostly interested in dabbling in Japanese games that I couldn't play anywhere else like Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, Okami and the Katamari series. I'm not sure why I never really got into any of the Sony 3D platformers like Ratchet and Clank, Crash Bandicoot, Jak and Daxter and Sly Cooper.

Xbox 360

One of the coolest perks of working at Silicon Knights in 2005 was that we all got our very own Xbox 360 when it launched that year. It was an exciting time and Microsoft seemed to be bringing a lot of cool new ideas to the table. The new UI and dashboard was a huge step forward, the addition of achievements was inspired and, of course, Xbox Live Arcade introduced the concept of indie games on console. I was excited to see smaller 2D games finding a home on a next-gen console alongside big budget AAA games. The Xbox 360 controller is also arguably the peak design for a video game controller.

The Xbox 360 was my main gaming system for the rest of the decade and beyond. Halo and Gears of War continued to be essential single player and multiplayer experiences and this is also where I chose to play games like Red Dead Redemption, Batman: Arkham Asylum and Rock Band. Shadow Complex, Limbo and Super Meat Boy are among the Xbox Live Arcade Games that I still have fond memories of. It was a great system and, unfortunately for Microsoft, the only time they were really king of the hill.

Nintendo Wii

Wii-mania hit a year after the Xbox 360 was released and it was absolutely massive. The PlayStation 3 also released within days of the Wii, which seems crazy now, but once again I was not a Sony early adopter so I wasn't paying that much attention. The Wii was selling out everywhere but one day at work we got a tip that Best Buy had just received a stock of Nintendo Wiis so we jumped in our car and headed over there just in time to get the last ones. What a rush.

For weeks on end we would have friends and family over to play Wii Sports and it was a blast. It is well-documented at this point just how much Wii Sports brought casual gamers into the Nintendo ecosystem. At the time it seemed like Nintendo might be shooting themselves in the foot with this motion control gimmick but clearly they made out like bandits. I was also very excited for The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess at the time but it ended up mostly collecting dust on my shelf.

In a way, that kind of sums up the Wii for me. I continued to buy a lot of Nintendo's first party games but I can't think of too many that I actually finished during this time. I'm not sure if the novelty wore off or if there were just other games on other consoles I was more interested in. There are definitely still a handful of Wii classics that I need to go back to eventually (ie. Super Mario Galaxy 1 + 2).

PlayStation 3

I ended the decade by purchasing a PlayStation 3. I didn't wait as long as I did for the PS2 but I was still a year or two behind the curve. (I may have also needed a Blu-ray player.) There were now a lot of Sony exclusives I was starting to take an interest in like Uncharted, Infamous, God of War, Little Big Planet, Heavy Rain and (eventually) The Last of Us. This was not my preferred console for the generation but over time Sony started catching up to Microsoft in a lot of areas. In 2009, they launched their Pub Fund, which helped bring some really cool indie games to their platform as well. That is when the tables really started to turn... but that is a story for another decade.

What were your favourite games and consoles from the 2000s? Let me know!

Next up: The 2010s.

The year is 2002. Horror movies are back in the mainstream and zombies are re-entering the zeitgeist. The Matrix is influencing every new action movie being produced. Video games are looking like the latest IP gold rush to hit Hollywood. Clearly the next step is for someone to make a live-action movie based on the Resident Evil game series... you might even call it a no brainer. But who can possibly handle the degree of difficulty that comes with adapting such a beloved property? Paul W.S. Anderson, that's who.

Yes, I am already regretting my decision to go back and watch all of the live-action Resident Evil movies. It's not so much that I can't sit through bad movies, it's more that I don't know if I can find all that much to say about them. I am getting the impression that there will not be a whole lot of variation between each movie in the series. And yet, perhaps that is part of the appeal?

The Resident Evil movie franchise has made over $1.2 billion across seven installments, all without a single one earning positive reviews. That is a pretty impressive achievement for Mr. Anderson and his collaborators. I had only seen a couple of these movies previously despite the fact that I am a fan of the Resident Evil games (although admittedly, I didn't really get into the series until Resident Evil 4). Jumping into the first movie now some 24 years later, it's hard to see how it spawned a sequel, let alone five or six.

Usually the first movie in a franchise is the thing that keeps people coming back for more. No matter how bad a sequel gets, there is always the hope that maybe the filmmakers will reclaim the magic of that original film. There should be a great premise, concept or world and a collection of memorable characters that you want to spend time with. This movie has none of those things. The one thing it does have is a cliffhanger ending that leaves you feeling a little bit intrigued, but otherwise, it's pretty dull stuff.

Milla Jovovich plays Alice, a woman who awakens in a mysterious mansion under lockdown without any memory of how she got there. Soon she is joined by a military team who escort her down to a top secret underground facility run by The Umbrella Corporation known as The Hive. It turns out that a genetically engineered virus was "accidentally" released in a lab down there that triggered the facility's artificial intelligence (known as Red Queen) to seal everything off and take extreme measures. Spoiler: Umbrella is up to no good and all of the people down there have now been turned into zombies.

From the outside looking in, I was always confused by the fact that these movies felt more like science-fiction than horror. I get that some of this comes from the genetic experimentation angle but I have to assume there was also a decision made to lean into sci-fi due to current trends and the fact that sci-fi was a bigger draw at the time. It's probably not until the halfway point that any zombies even show up at all. That being said, there are at least a couple of tense sequences where they are surrounded by hordes of zombies that feel less action-y and more reminiscent of something like Dawn of the Dead. Which is, you know, not horrible. (George A. Romero had been initially hired to direct this movie and there is a documentary about his take on the material out there. Maybe I'll check that out at some point.)

Paul W.S. Anderson already had a successful video game adaptation under his belt with Mortal Kombat but he had followed it up with Event Horizon and Soldier, both of which were box office bombs. You can see why he might appear to be an ideal choice to direct a Resident Evil movie, but you can also see where it might go wrong. He was supposedly a fan of the games but after all the money they had spent on the failed Romero version, Constantin Film were unsure about giving him the rights. He ended up having to write the movie as a spec script, leaving himself room to make it as a non-RE movie if they did not pick it up.

That is one of the reasons why the movie is only loosely based on the games and did not feature any characters from the games. I guess it was also intended to be a prequel of sorts, which may explain some of the disconnect. Perhaps most importantly, it was made at a time when comic book fans had not started to run Hollywood, which meant that being faithful to the source material simply was not as much of a priority as it is now. To be fair, this movie does at least feature a mansion, some zombies, some zombie dogs, and a brief mention of the Nemesis program. Oh, and a Licker.

The Licker is a mix of practical and CG effects, but the CG is pretty rough. I'm guessing it looked pretty bad even back in 2002. Speaking of rough CG, there is also a moderately amusing scene where several characters get sliced and diced by some lasers. They use that same cartoony effect also seen at the end of Equilibrium where it takes a few seconds for the body pieces to slide apart. Great stuff. The idea of a laser corridor was added to the Resident Evil 4 video game as a tribute to this scene a few years later. Capcom did also eventually add the Red Queen into the video game canon with The Umbrella Chronicles.

Getting away from the games, the primary selling point of this entire series has got to be Milla Jovovich, although in 2002 I'm not sure that was the case. She had her breakout role with The Fifth Element in 1997 but she hadn't fully transformed into an action star yet because this movie was arguably the turning point. That persona only starts to take shape towards the end of this movie because it takes a while for her memories to return, at which point she magically starts running up walls and kicking ass in slow motion. There is some satisfaction to seeing her come into her own but overall it feels a little more tentative than I expected. I am hoping for more ridiculous bullet time action in future films.

Aside from Milla Jovovich, the rest of the cast is pretty awful and the acting is C-tier level at best (and probably worse in many cases). Some might say that this was done on purpose to try and recreate the cheesy voice acting from the original games but I don't think I buy that. Michelle Rodriguez and James Purefoy are the next biggest stars and in my opinion they aren't much better than the other lesser known actors. I know the military characters are mostly expendable but good god they are boring.

The movie ends with Alice escaping to the surface where she finds that Raccoon City has become a post-apocalyptic wasteland of sorts. It reminds me a bit of The Purge in that you spend an entire movie stuck in a single location while you can't help think there are much more exciting stories happening in this world elsewhere. I am curious to see if the sequel can deliver on this promise but I don't have high hopes. At any rate, one down, six more to go. Any Resident Evil movie heads out there? Please tell me I have something to look forward to!

Man, what a week! Game Junk hit 1000 subscribers on YouTube and Space Junk hit 100 subscribers on Substack! You are all beautiful, wonderful people. Rest assured, we are not in any hurry to flip that monetization switch.

[This newsletter is brought to you by The Brick System, fine purveyors of interlocking brick toys.]

I am also writing this from the hospital as I attempt to pass a kidney stone. Like I said, what a week!

So I kind of wanted to attempt a weekly column for Space Junk where I would work my way through a specific TV series or movie franchise (a Space Junk Premium, if you will) but I couldn't find the right one to start with.  As it turns out, Zach Cregger's Resident Evil movie is about 2 months away, which should be just enough time to watch all of the live-action Resident Evil movies! Great idea, right? (Don't answer that.) I have only seen 2 or 3 previously but I'm going to call it RE Watch because that's just too good not to use. Feel free to follow along with me... or just let me suffer through it alone. Part 1 should be coming early next week.

To sweeten the deal, I am also going to *try* to play and write about some Resident Evil games I've never played before. Now I can't guarantee this is going to happen but I'm going to try to at least do the first Resident Evil (leaning toward Director's Cut instead of Remake). Resident Evil 3, 6 and 7 are the other ones I’ve never finished from the main line games (oh, and Code Veronica I guess). I'd love to dabble in a couple of the weirder RE games too, like The Umbrella Chronicles, Resident Evil Gaiden or even the Famicom predecessor Sweet Home but that might be pushing it. Anyway, I’ll figure something out. Let me know if there are other oddities I need to check out.

In other news, our physical copies of Garden City issue 2 have arrived from the printer and will be up for sale on Gumroad in the very near future. The cost of printing went up so the prices are probably going to be tweaked slightly. However, we will also be offering a very special digital download bonus for anyone who buys a copy (physical or digital): the original Dwyer Bros collaboration, Albinoman The Comic!

Jay is also planning to post one of our old Albinoman movies, Albinoman: The Motion Picture, over on his Art Brut Films Patreon in the near future. We are talking about doing some bonus stuff for that, possibly an audio commentary and/or something else. So keep an eye out for that too.

That’s about it for now. I am also working on part 3 of My History with Video Games and I may have a new review or two in the near future. Thanks for reading!

The older we get, the more we all slowly become a parody of ourselves. It is inevitable and happens to the best of us, but when you're a hotshot director with a fetish for leather jackets and pink and blue lighting, it becomes a little easier to spot. Nicolas Winding Refn is definitely at that point in his career now, although some might argue he has been there for years already.

Her Private Hell is his first film since 2016's The Neon Demon, after which he took a decade away to make a couple of TV shows. With a longer format and more creative control, he was seemingly given free rein to indulge in all of his cinematic impulses, good or bad. Personally, I think it leaned a little more toward the latter. I couldn't even get through Too Old to Die Young, which was a let down considering that I am also a fan of co-writer Ed Brubaker.

This new movie finds him continuing down the path of glacially-paced thrillers that operate almost entirely in metaphor. In the past, I have enjoyed puzzling out the meaning of some of his films, but usually there was also a surface level narrative that held some level of interest. I'm not sure that exists in Her Private Hell but I will do my best to provide a brief summary. Buckle up.

In a dystopian future, an actress named Elle (played by Sophie Thatcher) is about to star in a movie based on a comic book called Candy Floss. She lives with her father, Johnny Thunder (Dougray Scott), who all of the other actresses are infatuated with and who happens to be married to her former best friend / lover, Dominique (Havana Rose Liu). Meanwhile, a serial killer nicknamed The Leather Man is stalking the city while an American G.I. (Charles Melton) is in search of him and his missing daughter.

That plot synopsis probably sounds more coherent than the movie itself is. It also probably sounds a little more exciting too. In reality, everything moves so slow and the performances are so emotionless that many viewers will likely find themselves fighting to stay awake. Storylines fade in and out and blur together until it is unclear what is real and what is not. But this is what we've come to expect from Refn and the surreal, dreamlike vibe is obviously intentional.

The visuals are as lush and as colourful as many of his most recent works, although I admit it is starting to feel a little too familiar. The sci-fi setting at least gives him a slightly different aesthetic to play with; the scenes from the Candy Floss movie feel like his take on a neon-soaked Power Rangers, for example. Perhaps this was a way for him to work out the Barbarella TV series that he never got to make? I know some people dismiss his work as looking like a perfume commercial but personally I think he is dying to direct a Bond opening title sequence.

There are some brief moments of action and violence scattered throughout the film, but probably not enough to raise your heart rate much. The majority of this takes place in the Charles Melton storyline as he kicks down doors and brutally faces off against Yakuza members in search of his daughter. Unfortunately, the melodrama between Elle and Dominique seems to take up the majority of the screen time and I was much less enthralled with that. It's too bad because I like Sophie Thatcher and she seems like the perfect lead for a Nicolas Winding Refn movie. I did enjoy seeing her go off at the end of the movie.

Despite the obvious giallo influences in The Leather Man storyline, this is arguably even less of a straightforward horror movie than The Neon Demon was. That being said, it does share some thematic ties with that movie and seems to be commenting on Hollywood's exploitation of women (the title is also taken from a 1968 British sexploitation film). The score by Pino Donaggio (best known for his collaborations with Brian De Palma) is surprisingly emotional and acts as the glue that ultimately ties the horror, action and melodrama together.

While I have enjoyed a lot of Nicolas Winding Refn's previous films, this one really lost me. I'm sure there will be fans who still get something out of it but it never clicked for me and I question if there is even a click to be found. I can only imagine what it would be like to wander in off the streets and watch this movie with no previous knowledge of what I was getting into. It would indeed be a hellish experience and clearly NWR wouldn't have it any other way.

We've had a few other family movie nights over the past couple of months (including a trip to the drive-in to see Toy Story 5) but for now I will be keeping these write-ups focused specifically on watching older movies with the kids. This past weekend we sat down for another classic horror watch with Kieran: Evil Dead II. As I mentioned previously, the video game Dead by Daylight is driving a lot of his interest in the genre and Ashley J. Williams is indeed a playable character in that game. (Apparently Ash's middle name is Joanna? Was that something from the TV show? Not sure if I should be embarrassed about not knowing this.)

Anyway, I figured any self-respecting horror fan should be familiar with the Evil Dead series so I made the (controversial?) suggestion to jump right to Evil Dead II. Why start with the second film? Well, because it basically recaps the first film at the beginning anyway but it also has more overt comedy and less tree rape. Kieran seems to enjoy horror movies with a bit of humour in them so I thought this might be one he would appreciate. That being said, I'm still not sure he was totally prepared for it.

He didn't say much during the first half of the movie but at some point we paused it to make some popcorn and Kieran commented that it was, "Just another completely normal movie. Not weird at all!" Which was sarcasm obviously because the truth is he had never really seen anything like it. The camera movement, the Looney Tunes-esque violence, the buckets of blood and the overall chaos of the movie really set it apart. I'm sure it was pretty unique back in 1987, but it also feels pretty unique today. Maybe part of that is a reflection of how tame a lot movies are now, both stylistically and tonally.

People have definitely borrowed elements of Sam Raimi's style over the years (he and The Coen Brothers influenced each other, and many filmmakers also borrowed from The Coens) but I think the echoes of that have faded a bit. The independent film explosion of the '90s was a long time ago. Back then, it was not unusual to see aggressive visuals and strong aesthetic choices in major mainstream movies. Not so much anymore. (Side note: we tried watching Raising Arizona with the kids a few years ago and they were *not* into it.)

We discussed what it meant for the Evil Dead movies to be a lower budget production made by a group of friends in a single location (Evil Dead 1 much more so, obviously) and how that also plays into the look and feel of it. We also touched on the idea that Bruce Campbell is worshipped among horror fans but not really a big movie star. The term "cult classic" is definitely embodied by this franchise and was an interesting for Kieran to wrap his head around this concept. I explained that the movie used to be impossible to find on VHS at one time, a rare collector's item, but it eventually found its audience and now the trilogy may have the most separate home media releases out of any movie ever.

Kieran was familiar with Ash's iconic chainsaw hand from video games (I believe in Dead by Daylight he has the mechanical hand but in Fortnite he has the chainsaw) and I think that was a fun reveal for him. Other than that, the scene that seemed to make the biggest impression was the one where Ash is basically losing his mind and everything in the cabin is laughing maniacally with him. The violence and gore was never really a problem for Kieran because it is all so cartoony. That made me stop and wonder how the franchise had shifted in recent years to flaunting how extreme it can be in a slightly more sadistic way, but I suppose the original Evil Dead was considered a "video nasty" back in 1981 so it is arguably a part of the series DNA.

One other bit of trivia that Kieran found interesting was the idea of Sam Raimi's 1973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 making cameos in all of his other movies. He didn't think it would be too difficult to pull off until I told him that Raimi also directed a western, a prequel to The Wizard of Oz and that Army of Darkness takes place in medieval times. Speaking of which, jumping back in time for the ending of this movie and leaving it on a cliffhanger is a pretty ballsy move too. However, Kieran didn't seem too shocked by it... I think the movie had already basically established that anything was possible at that point. I believe he just said it was "a very normal ending to a very normal movie."

All in all, I don’t think he would consider Evil Dead II a new favourite but I do think he had fun with it. I would like to follow this viewing up with Army of Darkness of course (which was my own introduction to the series), but Kieran seems to resist watching sequels even for movies he really liked. There is one last note that only occurred to me as I was writing this: the subtitle of Evil Dead II is Dead by Dawn, which was probably the inspiration for the name of the video game Dead by Daylight! (Duh.) I relayed this revelation to Kieran and he nodded politely, clearly unimpressed, before returning to whatever Dead by Daylight video he was currently in the middle of watching on YouTube.

It's time to continue our journey through video game history into the '90s. A lot of major leaps happened during this time and you could argue that this is the decade where video games really came of age. Unfortunately, I missed out on some major consoles in this era and kind of lost touch with gaming for a while... I guess because I was busy coming of age too. Anyway, I'll do my best to balance my personal memories with some of the other things going on at the time because there is a lot to talk about. Let's get into it.

Game Boy

This was a big one for me. Technically, Game Boy launched in 1989 but I didn't get one until a year or two later. I remember when it was first hitting stores, I didn't fully understand that it could play proper NES-style games. Because of the monochromatic LCD display, it seemed reminiscent of the Tiger handheld electronic games that were popular at the time (not unlike Nintendo's own Game & Watch series). I thought maybe that's all it could do, but once I realized that was not the case, I needed one immediately. The thought of being able to bring a Nintendo with you wherever you go was basically the coolest thing ever. In theory, that is.

In reality, I rarely took my Game Boy anywhere with me and I had an AC adapter for it so I almost always had it plugged in. It also was preferable to be close to a lamp because sometimes it was hard to see the non-backlit screen. But despite the technical limitations, there were some genuinely great games for the Game Boy and we were starting to see some big quality of life improvements in terms of game design. While most NES games still required a password system to save, Game Boy is where battery backup became the norm. Games were also starting to shift away from the hard-as-nails quarter-munching arcade mentality to something a little more accessible. As a result, I actually started to complete games on occasion including games like Metroid II, The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening and Final Fantasy Adventure (to this day, the only Final Fantasy game I've played through and, yeah I know, it isn't even technically a Final Fantasy game... yikes).

There weren't a lot of places that rented Game Boy games (I guess because of their size?) but they were a bit cheaper to buy and I was starting to have some of my own money to spend. I remember saving up money to buy NBA All-Star Challenge, which was... okay. My brother did eventually get a Game Boy as well but we were rarely able to play multiplayer games because we both had to own a copy of the game. I think Blades of Steel and Tetris were the only ones we both owned. We didn't know anyone else with a Game Boy either so there weren't a lot of opportunities for multiplayer sessions or trading games. I remember buying the Game Boy 4-player adapter which came bundled with F1 Race but I honestly don't know if I ever used it.

Super Nintendo

In the early '90s, the next-gen console race was also heating up. The Turbografx 16 and Sega Genesis both launched in 1989 and I never owned either one but I did have some friends who owned them. The TG-16 may not have been a "true" 16-bit system but it still had some pretty cool games. I remember enjoying Bonk's Adventure, Dungeon Explorer and Blazing Lazers, among others. And although Sonic was a big deal, I was most interested in the sports games on the Sega Genesis. But for some reason I never really wanted one.

When the Super Nintendo came out in 1991, I seem to remember renting the console (which was also a thing you could do) along with Super Mario World, giving us our first real taste of the 16-bit era. It was great but my brother and I didn't feel the overwhelming need to own one until we played NHLPA Hockey 93 a few years later. It was a bit of a game changer because it had the real NHL teams and players but also each player's attributes matched their play style in real life. There were a lot of cool little details. You could set up Al MacInnis to break the glass with his slapshot or lay people out with an open ice hit from Scott Stevens. (You couldn't make Gretzky's head bleed on the SNES, unfortunately.) We got the SNES for Christmas that year and proceeded to buy mostly sports games for the next few years.

When I said earlier that I lost touch with games for a while, that may have been a slight exaggeration. They were still around, but they were mostly a social thing for me during these years. The latest NHL game was always being played whenever we hung out with friends along with Super Mario Kart and/or NBA Jam. But I definitely lost touch with single player games for more than a few years. I was all about sports and music in the mid-'90s. That being said, I did pick up both Super Metroid and The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past years after they had both been released and absolutely loved them so I was still dipping a toe in occasionally.

Macintosh LC III

The other thing that was happening in the early to mid '90s was PC gaming was becoming a big deal. Doom was released in 1993 and shareware was being popularized as a way to distribute games. Once again, however, I missed the boat here because my parents bought a Mac around this time instead. I actually didn't mind too much... I was happy just to have a new computer to do word processing and other stuff for school. But I would occasionally see friends playing Wolfenstein, Doom or the latest point-and-click adventure and feel a bit jealous.

Truth be told, a lot of these games were probably available for Mac (I did buy a Leisure Suit Larry game for it at some point) but they were just harder to find. I remember buying Microsoft Flight Simulator for the Mac and also playing a handful of weird shareware games. Among them were some Mac-specific point-and-click adventure games created with a program called World Builder. I always wanted to try to make my own game with it but I never could get a hold of it. (It recently made a comeback with an indie game released this year called Transfer Point.)

Nintendo 64

The Sony Playstation was released in 1995 but at the time it wasn't really on my radar. I remember seeing the Crash Bandicoot commercials a while later but I was just completely tuned out. I did eventually see a bit of Resident Evil and Metal Gear Solid at a friend's place years later and I understood some of the hype. But it wasn't until the N64 arrived that I started getting excited about video games again. I remember trying a Super Mario 64 demo at Toys R Us and being stunned. They had figured out how to make Mario work in 3D. It took a little getting used to but it opened up a whole new world of possibilities. When Goldeneye came out in 1997, that was the clincher. It was actually Alicia who bought the Nintendo 64 for me as a birthday gift (which was way too much money to be spending on me). But that was what pulled me back in.

In addition to Goldeneye, I also have fond memories of Perfect Dark, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, Mario Kart 64 and The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time (although I was stuck on that stupid water temple for years). This era of gaming can be pretty rough to return to nowadays, but at the time we were looking past the ugly polygons and brutal frame rates because it was all about the immersion. I was taking Computer Science at university by this time and I was starting to think about game development as a possible career path. I just didn't really know how to make it happen.

PC

I guess if I'm going to mention the Mac, I need to clarify that I did eventually get a PC, probably towards the end of the decade. I think it was a Pentium 166? I didn't do a whole lot of gaming on it initially but I did have one summer where I got really into Half-Life and the various Half-Life mods like Counterstrike and Day of Defeat. I also remember playing Star Wars Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight and Day of the Tentacle (at least a few years late). And somewhere in there I also discovered emulation. What a rush that was! All my memories of the '80s came flooding back.

Anyway, that's it for the '90s. Next up: 2K Baby!

Since the new Film Junk format no longer requires us to stay on top of every new release, I had been accumulating a bit of a backlog of movies I wanted to catch up on over the past few months. Now that I’m at least partially caught up, I'm not sure how I feel about the year so far. There has been a lot of good stuff but not a ton of so-called "bangers". (Are my banger standards just too high?) I feel like only a few of the movies on this list are close to a lock for my year end list, especially if things improve in the second half of the year (which they usually do). Anyway, here are the motion pictures that stood out to me so far in 2026. Let me know what else I missed!

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

It may not have been as successful as Danny Boyle's 28 Years Later or as textured but Nia DaCosta's immediate follow-up continued to take the franchise down strange and unexpected paths. The zombies arguably took a backseat a long time ago and now we are spending time with a roving gang of maniacs and the gentle and empathetic Dr. Kelson who is working on a cure for the virus. When they eventually cross paths, it all leads to spectacular climax that will rewire Iron Maiden in your brain forever.

Backrooms

I am certainly not the target audience for this movie but maybe that's why it felt somewhat new and fresh to me. Backrooms vaguely attempts to shoehorn in a facsimile of a conventional story (mostly unsuccessfully) but the concept of liminal spaces remains eerie and compelling on the big screen. At the very least, the atmosphere and imagery will stick with you afterward.

The Christophers

You never know what Steven Soderbergh is going to do next. The Christophers feels in some ways like a return to the heist genre for him but it is ultimately going for something different. The plot revolves around an art scam that ends up providing a rumination on creativity, originality, inspiration and legacy. There are some fun twists to be had and a wonderful performance by Ian McKellen as well.

Dead Man's Wire

Gus Van Sant's true crime thriller is based on the story of Tony Kiritsis, a man who held his mortgage broker hostage for 3 days straight in 1977 with a shotgun wired to his neck. The event led to a media frenzy where some people saw him as a folk hero of sorts because he was standing up to The Man. The movie strikes a good balance though. It has a lighter touch than you might expect but also plenty of tense moments as well.

The Drama

A dark comedy that examines the fallout after a bride-to-be reveals something horrible to her fiance about her past. Outrage ensues and the result is an interesting thought experiment and prickly moral dilemma that has no easy answers. You could say that there are not a lot of people acting rationally in the movie, but I think that is part of the point.

I Love Boosters

Colourful, comedic and visually inventive, Boots Riley's latest film skewers the fashion world while taking breaking down the various layers of exploitation within capitalism. If that doesn't interest you, you can still just look at the pretty pictures and laugh at how weird it gets.

Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie

One of the more unexpected breakout indies of the year. It may be sequel to a TV series that a lot of people haven't seen but the good news is it doesn't require any previous knowledge to enjoy. This is a meta-time travel comedy filled with creative set pieces, Canadian in-jokes, pop culture references and a little bit of heart as well.

Obsession

Yeah we were behind the curve on this one but I think I understand the hype now. It is a very modern take on The Monkey's Paw cranked up to 11 with some dark humour and shocking moments of violence. It gives you plenty to chew on afterward but it also just works on a very visceral level.

The Odyssey

Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey is not a perfect film (in my opinion) but it is definitely ambitious. I felt the 3 hour runtime at points but the movie still manages to have a surprisingly strong emotional arc, some thrilling sequences and plenty of unique imagery. In particular, his take on the Trojan Horse, cyclops and Circe’s sorcery will remain with me for quite some time.

Project Hail Mary

An imaginative science-fiction story and a real crowd pleaser that I had a great time with. Some of the rougher edges of the book got sanded down but most of the ideas and the heart of the story were there. At the risk of incurring the wrath of the Hail Mary Mob I will say Rocky was maybe a little too cute but the use of a puppet was clearly an inspired choice and the cinematography delivered on the big screen. Gosling was alright too.

In case you missed it, here’s my list of the Best Games of 2026 (So Far).