[Movies] Cooties (2014)

The b-movie genre has sort of evolved into the horror comedy over the years, I feel. I distinguish the two as b-movies trying to be serious but not having the budget to do so while horror comedies aim to be funny but use horror elements and even b-movie elements to convey that on-screen. Sometimes it can be funny and other times it just gets a little awkward. The sort of campiness that is achieved naturally by those older movies.

Cooties feels like one of those movies - a horror comedy that clearly makes reference to the joys of old school zombie movies with all the crazy gore and fake blood. But at the same time it's quite the comedic effort with a good number of one-liners thrown in for good measure.

It is interesting how Elijah Wood has been taking his career in recent years. Getting involved in projects as big as LOTR can really limit you and I feel like his choices in terms of projects have been all about having fun while demonstrating range. And he certainly has a knack for being the straight man in comedic routines.

[Games] Last Night on Earth: Blood in the Forest

So after the fun that was the Timber Peak expansion for Last Night on Earth, we get another expansion somewhat more tired to that story with Blood in the Forest. I had already liked what Timber Peak had added to the game more than other expansions, Blood in the Forest is probably one of the more visually striking additions to the game. Plus it's a heck of a lot of fun.

But now we're all used to how Flying Frog Productions has been handling this franchise in terms of its expansions. We get 2 or more new hero characters and we get more cards and some other bell or whistle. But this expansion really added something distinct to the game in terms of the new zombies and the new board pieces that really shake things up. And we're all the better for it. It's harder to go back to just the base game once you've played this particular expansion.

[TV] The Walking Dead: Season 5

As I mentioned last time, The Walking Dead continues to linger on that last of TV shows that we watch and increasingly don't know why we continue to do so. The plot lines have just gotten more and more convoluted and things only seem to move forward based on continually bad decisions by the characters involved. And it's not like we were all that into modern zombie culture, if you can even call it a culture, really.

And that last season really ended on a weird note with the whole Terminus story. Yet another example of possible shelter not being quite that, which seems to be a primary theme in this show. And that's truly a reality in this dark post zombie apocalypse world, I'm sure. But man, is that all this show is going to be about time and time again?

It's a bleak show, and things do need to be bleak. But five seasons into the show I think we all need to take a step back and wonder where this show needs to go. The characters need to have some sense of purpose, and thus far we have everyone slowly breaking down, it's a wonder they're still alive.

[TV] The Walking Dead: Season 4

The Walking Dead is feeling more and more like an RPG campaign that's going on for a little too long. Sure, there are still interesting encounters here and there and moments of awesome for each of the characters, but overall the story doesn't seem to be going anywhere significant. And that's not too unexpected since it's the tragic fate of almost all zombie stories.

The show is a survival piece and every episode tries to focus on situations of various difficulty that the survivors need to get through. There was a bit of a goal in the first season with eventually trying to get to the CDC in the hopes of finding information about a possible cure. But things like that have disappeared and now it's just a lot of character drama and zombies.

And the zombies are still pretty good, don't get me wrong. But you can only watch so many scenes of zombie squishing and CGI head explosions. We need a bit more than that and I'm not sure if the show is going to get around to that.

[Games] Last Night on Earth: Timber Peak Expansion

So we were a little underwhelmed by Growing Hunger, one of the first expansions for Last Night on Earth. And while it provided some good game options and new ways to diversify play, on the whole it didn't feel quite as balanced as it could have been.

But then comes the Timber Peak expansion for Last Night on Earth that is actually a standalone game. And while it still largely provides the same game experience as the first game, this expansion certainly adds other nuances to the experience that help set it apart and make things feel a bit new again.

Interestingly enough, this game is now set in a new town of Timber Peak, whereas the first game was set in Woodinvale. For those who appreciate the value of a good meta-plot, this expansion adds a little bit more flavor to help flesh things out.

[TV] In The Flesh: Series 2

The first season of In The Flesh was a pretty novel bit of television. More than your typical zombie TV show, it was based around a pretty unique premise - what if zombies could be "cured" after a zombie expedition. And while originally envisioned as a limited mini-series, the show was eventually confirmed for a second, longer season to expand on the story.

Admittedly I was rather worried that there wasn't much more story to tell. The original mini-series had a pretty strong concept and it had managed to tell a rather tight story. The whole curing of the zombie hordes was merely part of the setting - the core story was really about Kieren and the tale of his death and his return to life.

But this second series was pretty phenomenal with so many different plot points going the same time. The show really upped the ante this time around by exploring quite a number of different angles that stem from the premise of the dead coming back. It took a while to build up, but the final payoff was pretty satisfying.

[Games] Last Night on Earth: Growing Hunger Expansion

I had been pretty much sold on Last Night on Earth when I had first watched the Tabletop episode featuring the game. This feeling carried over to when I finally bought a copy of the base game since I immediately gambled on purchasing the Growing Hunger expansion as well. And it actually took us a few game nights before we felt comfortable enough with the base game before finally bringing out the expansion.

The Growing Hunger expansion is pretty basic as far as expansions go - it's all about adding more characters more board pieces and more cards. But this doesn't make it a bad expansion - just not quite as exception as compared later expansions.

I enjoyed reading this Board Game Geek review that cites that this isn't the sort of expansion that would get people unimpressed with the first game to get on the bandwagon, as it were. And that's a pretty decent assessment. It's good and adds more of the same fun that we've seen thus far but it's nothing amazing either.

[Games] Zombie Dice

Tobie and I have just come back from another trip to Singapore. And our Singapore adventures are never complete without a trip to our favorite gaming hangout, Paradigm Infinitum. And we've picked up a few more games to add to our collection, which will act as fuel for future reviews and of course many, many game nights.

Zombie Dice is a game that I've been considering picking up for a while now. And while it's ridiculously simple,the fun of the game lies in this very aspect of the game. And what's even better is the fact that the game scales to support a large number of players, which is always a good thing for game nights with friends.

Dice games are always a bit of a  mixed bag, although most American games tend to rely on dice a lot as a way to introduce randomness into things. And thus the element of chance can be a little annoying at times, but it does make it easier for new players to try their luck and experience the game for themselves.

Such gateway games are always an essential part of any gaming collection. After all, not everyone is automatically ready to get into the heavier games.

[Games] Last of Us (PS3)

It's interesting how video games continue to evolve. We've come a long way from the only story elements in the game being the basic premise alone and little else. Now we see more and more games trying to integrate a rich story to give more purpose to the core game mechanic. And this has been particularly prominent in several titles released by Naughty Dog.

The Last of Us has gotten a lot of great press for being a game that goes way beyond the level of story experienced with other similar games. There are already talks of the game being adapted into a movie with Maisie Williams starring as Ellie, which is saying a lot given her Game of Thrones fame.

But to give credit where credit is due, the game is pretty riveting even just to watch - and you don't see too many games like that. I keep encountering stories of groups of friends or even family gathering around to just watch one person play through the game while everyone else keeps up with what's going on in terms of the overall narrative. And such shared experiences are something to be celebrated really, especially when triggered by a video game (despite prevailing negative stereotypes).

[Books] Night of the Living Trekkies

When I first saw Trekkies at a local bookstore, I wasn't too eager to get the book. As much as I'm a Star Trek fan, something about the book seemed too cheesy and I was genuinely worried that it would just end up being a bad parody title that made fun of Star Trek fans in the same way The Big Bang Theory is accused of mocking geek culture.

As with many books though, all it took was a low enough Kindle Daily Deal to eventually hook me in. I picked up an ebook copy of the title and finally found the time to read it somewhat recently. And as far as a weird parody piece involving Star Trek fans and zombies, it actually wasn't that bad.

And as I progressed through the novel, I had to admit that I could only marvel at the author's ability to write an authentic Star Trek fan story while still marrying it in a meaningful way to the zombie genre. I actually liked this book a lot more than Pride and Prejudice and Zombies  since it managed to combine the two genres a lot better.

Plus it's a lot more brilliant than it lets on.

[TV] In The Flesh: Series 1

I have to admit that I was surprised to find out that the BBC had commissioned a second series for In the Flesh, given that it had initially been advertised as a limited mini-series. It certainly had a compelling premise that got me and my partner interested in the first place and now they've actually taken it upon themselves to extend the story further. And this is not a bad thing at all.

So with this second season, I'm rushing back to write a review for the original mini-series in order to mark this show on the Geeky Guide. And the need to have it is is also drive by the fact that I really did enjoy it and respected what they were trying to achieve.

I know I've already said this before, but it deserves saying again. UK television, whether we're talking about any of the BBC channels, ITV or Channel 4, there are so many interesting shows coming out of their creative efforts. With science fiction shows dying left and right on US networks, it's a relief that we're still seeing good stuff here. They may often be rather limited, but they tend to be of very high quality.

[TV] The Walking Dead: Season 3

Of course it's just when I finished up watching the fourth season of The Walking Dead and start considering my review that I realize that I never got around to posting a formal review for the third season. And thus I need to get this review finished before I get to the more recent season since I'm a tad obsessive compulsive that way. I mean seriously, that's the only way things will make sense, right?

As I look back at this particular season and kind of puzzle over what happened, I think I have a pretty good idea why I let this one simmer on the back burner for so long. The second season had left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, and so there was a lot riding on the shoulders of this third season. And that sort of just upped the stakes even further as set our expectations on getting something good.

This was rater confounded by the fact that this third season went back to the comic books for greater inspiration, hence the introduction of the prison as a sanctuary for our little band of survivors and the introduction of the infamous character that is the Governor. Although how things came together wasn't quite as ideal as could be hoped. But it wasn't all that bad either.

[Movies] World War Z (2013)

This is definitely a case of a movie where I had read the book that it was based on beforehand. In fact, I loved the book. But that shouldn't matter in this review.

As I've stated before, my goal when writing such reviews for adaptations is to keep the different versions separate from one another. This is to ensure that each instance of the (more or less) same story gets its fair chance in terms of a review. That sounds reasonable, right?

Admittedly it was a bit tricky for me to keep that separation in mind when I started thinking about this review given how strongly I feel about the book and the amazing liberties taken with the movie's version of the story. And by "liberties" I refer to how the book and the movie essentially only have the title in common and not much else.

Thus while it's a shame that they diverged from the source material so much, at the same time my principles as a review require me to try to remain more or less "impartial" in discussing this movie and not going back to the book too much.

[Movies] Warm Bodies (2013)

February typically means a whole slew of romance movies, down to the quite literal movie Valentine's Day, for example. And it's only proper, I suppose, since this is the month were a lot of people indulge in the celebration of love that is the Valentine's day holiday.

But this year saw a most unusual entry in the romance department - in this case the zombie romance Warm Bodies. And yes, I said zombies.

Now zombies culture have gained quite a following in recent years, especially with shows like The Walking Dead and movies like Zombieland, to cite a few examples. It's hard to explain precisely why zombies have made such a big comeback in popular culture, but they're certainly here to stay.

And I suppose a zombie-themed romantic comedy was practically inevitable. It does make for an unusual marrying genres given we typically associate zombies with the horror genre, but then again other movies have demonstrated that zombies do make for an interesting concept for comedy in general.

[Movies] Resident Evil: Retribution (2012)

The Resident Evil franchise of video games and movies is one of the longer-spanning ones and one of the rare examples of video game related movies maintaining a decent following. And while they aren't exactly Oscar-award worth movies, they are certainly entertaining. Thus the movies have managed to gather quite a fan following over the years.

Now when a movie reaches this many sequels, the overall quality of the narrative does become rather suspect. Even the Terminator got pretty silly as the series dragged on, and this is despite my love for robots in general. And for a movie to reach its fifth installment, well, that says a lot.

To be fair, the RE movies aren't entirely bad, per se. But they could certainly be a lot better too. And while I don't think the series has suffered too much from the declining quality problem of most movies of this type, it's not like it necessarily aimed very high throughout the sequels. So they're pretty consistent, but also rather consistently mediocre.

[Games] Zombie Cafe (Android)

I've only recently started to explore the Google Play Store and the various applications available for the Android platform. And that naturally leads one to explore a variety of Android games, which is the common distraction for mobile devices including tablets.

Now I only downloaded this game for two major reasons. The first is the fact that it was listed as one of the featured games in the Google Play Store. The other reason is that it was a free game, which is probably the most common reason any of us make the decision to acquire an application. Such "freemium" games rely on such a low barrier to entry in an effort to hook more players in and eventually get them to spend real money on bonuses in the game.

I wasn't exactly hooked.

[Books] Feed (Newsflesh Trilogy Book 1)

For movies, I don't often rely on awards shows to determine my movie selections since I often find that the winners don't always represent movies that I actually enjoy watching. However when it comes to books, I admit that I pay a bit more attention with an author gets recognized, especially in the realms of science fiction and fantasy. It's funny how I see these two mediums so differently - might just mean I'm quirky or that the Oscars are broken. Take your pick.

I noticed this book when it managed to get itself a Hugo nomination despite it seeming to be just another zombie book. And seriously, we've reached a point when media companies are trying to include the zombie concept in just about any genre, thus resulting in a lot of weird mash-ups that we probably don't need. And I'll admit that I've ventured into some of these mash-ups out of sheer curiosity with rather mixed results.

Feed stood out since it did manage to get a nomination for the Hugo Award for Best New Novel - and I really respect the Hugo Awards. So when a decent enough deal came up for me to pick up the Kindle version of this book, I was all over it - and definitely happy that I did so.

[Books] Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I was never really into the whole zombie pop culture thing. I have nothing against zombies - I just don't necessarily feel a particular interest towards the movies and computer games related to them. Maybe I think they're creepier than they should be. Perhaps I just hate how slow they are as units in games like Heroes of Might and Magic II.

Yeah, I don't think I'll ever get myself out of that particular installment of the series. So sue me.

Anyway, we were talking about zombies. There's certainly an inherent element of morbid fun to the zombie genre when you get down to it and more creative artists have managed to have some real fun with the concept, especially with comedy movies like Fido and of course Shaun of the Dead. But that's movies and zombies have lived in Hollywood for some time now. It's also nice to see the zombie culture trying to break into books in highly creative ways.

[Movies] Zombieland (2009)

I've mentioned a number of times now that zombies have gained popularity in recent days for some reason. It's not overly deliberate that I seem to be reviewing a number of zombie movies these days - there are just so many of them, it's hard to avoid it completely. Just wait for me to get around to reviewing DC's Blackest Night story arc once it finishes.

The typical zombie story has seen certain variations in recent years such as making the zombies being capable of running for a change or making them capable of limited speech. Whatever the variation, we end up with mixed results in terms of how these movies fare in the public arena. I'm not a particularly major zombie follower, but I do enjoy tracking the different techniques and seeing how things go.

I think I'm developing a taste for zombie comedies, though.

[Games] Plants vs. Zombies

Computer game development has become the kind of thing that nearly anyone with a great idea and programming skills (or at least friends who have those skills) can easily get into. In line with the Dot Com book where software development became the big thing of the 90's, so has the possibility of creating some great games that you don't have to market directly in retail stores. More and more people tend to focus on advertising their products online by offering free versions of their games online or as iPhone Apps and then charging for full downloads later on.

It's hard to track when this began exactly but I think it's safe to say that a large factor in the rise of such games is partnerships like Yahoo! Games, MSN Games and more recently Facebook that allowed developers to get their games featured under larger brand name banners. Over time, I have to admit I've become quite the fan of a particular company known as PopCap Games, who have created amazing games like Bejeweled and Feeding Frenzy.

Today we're talking about the insanely addicting Plants vs. Zombies, a definitely unusual spin on the Tower Defense genre of gaming. In this game the goal is pretty straightforward (as always with such games) - Zombies are trying to invade your home and eat the brains of your family. In order to stop their advance, you have the gift of a variety of plants that can attack the zombies and thwart their plans. These range from Pea Shooters that fire peas as basic projectiles to Sunflowers that produce extra "suns" that is the main form of currency in the game.

Zombies are all the rage these days it seems, and for good reason. There's just something about them that tickles the mind and gets everyone in a particular mind set that many, many zombie movies have conditioned. Combining that concept with the tower defense idea was just sheer genius and has resulted in a very entertaining game.

I was surprised by the fact that it hasn't become overly repetitive yet - the developers really put some careful thought into this game in order to ensure that it had great balance and increasing levels of difficulty that are challenging yet still achievable. The variety of plant-based weapons can get pretty nutty over time but that just goes to show how creative the game makers were. Better yet is the fact that they limit how many plants you can bring with you at the start of each level and thus you need to plan ahead in terms of how you'll deal with the assortment of zombies being sent against you.

And there's certainly no lack of humor in the zombie department either! You will find yourself starting out with the basic zombie but then eventually facing zombies with football gear as protection of those hanging from bungee cords who will try to steal your plants! The variety of zombies can get really silly, but it's all part of the brand of humor the game is trying to put forward.

I totally love this game and can't wait to see what's waiting for me in the next level. Not to mention the increasing number of mini-games, puzzles and side venture you can toy with such as the Zen Garden.

Plants vs. Zombies gets a full 5 lawnmowers out of a possible 5.