Sunday, 1 January 2017

Looking back at 2016


You'd be hard pressed to find many good things that happened in 2016. It's been a turbulent time both personally and globally. Once again I have listed a few things I've seen or heard in the year that I liked. Not all of them actually came out this year but are part of my overall experience of this year.

Film: Ran (1985)


One of the later Kurosawa films which proved the director was still good. A re-telling of 'King Lear' in which the ruler hands over his kingdom to his two of his three sons while the other is disgraced. The theme of events spiraling out of control was quite fitting for this year actually.

TV Show: War & Peace (BBC, 2016)


When critics spoke of the BBC adaption of Leo Tolstoy's War & Peace, they tended to focus on the romance and brief nudity scenes, ignoring the fact that this was a genuinly good piece of drama regardless of those elements. Paul Dane is great as Pierre Bezukhov while Lily James is great as Natasha Rostova and there are lots of good guest actors such as Jim Broadbent and Brian Cox. I would definately recommend this to others.


Videogame: Fran Bow (2015)


A psychological horror game about a little girl named Fran who has been placed in a mental institution following the murder of her parents. The cutesy images behind the more horrific elements which include human experimentation, the sexual exploitation of children and madness.

Album: Super (Pet Shop Boys, 2016)
The return of the Pet Shop Boys was decent enough and included some good songs such as 'Pop Kids' and 'Inner Sanctum'.

Personal Event: Completing Higher Education
Getting to the end of higher education which was a long hard slog but paid off in the end.

Other Event: Star Trek's 50th anniversary




The 50th anniversary of Star Trek was a fairly quiet affair in the UK but there was at least the slow and steady development of Discovery to keep an eye on. I'm not the biggest Star Trek fan but I do quite like the Movies and  Deep Space Nine is my favourite series. If Discovery is anything like those movies they will be good. The world could certainly do with the Federation's utopian values these days.

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