Adam Selvidge's Website Blog
Red One: Directed by Jake Kasdan. With Dwayne Johnson, Chris Evans, Lucy Liu, J.K. Simmons. After Santa Claus is kidnapped, the North Pole’s Head of Security must team up with a notorious hacker in a globe-trotting, action-packed mission to save Christmas. I was expecting something much lighter than what this ended up being. It has some pretty familiar elements of the Santa / Krampus lore, tying them together with the thread of dozens of other winter myths. There’s a number of very famous people that are famous for being famous in other famous things, so if you want a nice...
Die Hard: Directed by John McTiernan. With Bruce Willis, Bonnie Bedelia, Reginald VelJohnson, Paul Gleason. A New York City police officer tries to save his estranged wife and several others taken hostage by terrorists during a Christmas party at the Nakatomi Plaza in Los Angeles. It’s a holiday movie. Not necessarily a Christmas movie, but it’s something that’s so loved for the holiday that it has to be watched. Right? Buy On Amazon!
Think you know Star Trek, the original series like no fans has done before? Well boldly go and take up our unique puzzle challenge! I honestly thought I would enjoy this more than I ended up liking it. Perhaps my initial expectations were too general, I was originally assuming this was going to be a “where’s waldo” type of situation, but it ended up being more of a “what esoteric Trek episode knowledge do you have” mix with a “make a judgement on if this is just funny or the thing we’re pointing out that’s wrong” with every beautifully done...
Secret Level: With Keanu Reeves, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Emily Swallow, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje. Original stories set within the worlds of iconic video games are featured in this animated anthology series. The episodes are short, but wow do each of them pack a punch. It’s a familiar format and one that i would gladly and happily like to see more of, short and to the point with very little fat left to waffle over. Buy On Amazon!
A first-person survival game set on a post-apocalyptic, ecologically ruined Earth. Play solo or with up to 3 friends as you build, upgrade, and fly a high-tech airship. Scavenge resources, craft tools, and face dangers on the surface as you hunt for a cure to save humanity. I broke one of my cardinal rules of videos games and played an Early Access game before it was officially released, so going in I knew that the story was not finished and there’s some significant chunks of the game play that are TBD. With that expectation properly set, I’ll give the highest...
Lioness: Created by Taylor Sheridan. With Zoe Saldana, Laysla De Oliveira, Dave Annable, Jill Wagner. CIA operative Joe attempts to balance her personal and professional lives as the tip of the spear in the agency’s war on terror. Moves quickly right out the gate and sets a captivating scene of spy work, confidence games, bad asses with guns, political tension, and sexual confusion. It does all that and wraps up a tightly woven story in just 8 episodes! I can’t wait to see what season 2 will bring. Buy On Amazon!
A Nonsense Christmas with Sabrina Carpenter: Directed by Sam Wrench. With Sabrina Carpenter, Cara Delevingne, Sean Astin, Nico Hiraga. Pop icon Sabrina Carpenter jingles all the bells in her first ever variety music special. Bobble headed Sabrina Carpenter has her own Christmas special and it’s full of oddly placed and oddly timed sexual innuendos that nearly universally fail to land. She one of those stars that I just fundamentally don’t understand the appeal, so if you’re a fan, I mean no disrespect but there’s not much that I appreciate about her performances, wigs, weird makeup, or nearly any of the...
A Man on the Inside: With Ted Danson, Mary Elizabeth Ellis, Lilah Richcreek Estrada, Stephanie Beatriz. Charles, a retired man, gets a new lease on life when he answers an ad from a private investigator and becomes a mole in a secret investigation in a nursing home. Starts off feeling like a sappy low budget comedy, but quickly moves past that in the first 15 minutes. It quickly evolved into a show with deep emotion, dealing with some pretty heavy topics that the cast easily take on. There’s plenty of familiar faces here from the Director of the residence to...
Sunny: Created by Katie Robbins. With Rashida Jones, Hidetoshi Nishijima, Joanna Sotomura, Judy Ongg. Follows Suzie, an American woman living in Japan, and Sunny, a domestic robot made by her husband’s company, as they uncover the dark truth of what really happened to Suzie’s husband and son, who disappeared in a mysterious plane crash. A great series exploring grief, loneliness, and love, all set in a normal feeling Japanese town, until you start scratching the surface and all sorts of fun and weird things are going on. Rashida Jones is pretty darn good here. I’m not sure how I feel...
Galaxy Quest: Directed by Dean Parisot. With Tim Allen, Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Tony Shalhoub. The alumni cast of a space opera television series have to play their roles as the real thing when an alien race needs their help. However, they also have to defend both Earth and the alien race from a reptilian warlord. Out now on 4k disk, this movie still holds up as one of the best good natured parodies of Star Trek that has ever come out. There’s been constant talk of a television series in the works, but it still hasn’t happened. I’m mostly...
