Book #186 of 2025: Julie Chan Is Dead by Liann Zhang This title starts off well, as a sort of YA Yellowface meets Ripley, but it takes some decidedly odd turns and gets pretty unhinged by the end. The initial premise at least is fun — the protagonist stumbles across the body of her estranged …
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Book #185 of 2025: Doctor Who: The Robot Revolution by Una McCormack Una McCormack makes it look easy. She takes a fun but messy installment of Doctor Who, which on TV struggles to balance introducing the new companion and season-long plot with the immediate wacky adventure at hand — involving an ordinary nurse getting whisked …
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Book #184 of 2025: Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman (Dungeon Crawler Carl #1) I hate to be contrarian when I’ve heard such promising chatter about the title, but this 2020 series debut is an unfortunate miss for me. Although I can understand why it’s found an audience, it’s not a piece I’ve particularly enjoyed …
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Book #183 of 2025: The Man Who Died Seven Times by Yasuhiko Nishizawa I’m a sucker for a good time loop story, but I’m afraid this 1995 Japanese novel, newly translated into English, doesn’t get there for me. It’s not a fault in the premise, which isn’t that absurd for this particular genre: the teenage …
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Book #182 of 2025: Star Wars: The Acolyte: The Crystal Crown by Tessa Gratton I remain dissatisfied with Disney’s treatment of the Acolyte branch of its Star Wars universe: first canceling the flawed-but-engaging TV show after a single season that ended on several obvious cliffhangers, and then, presumably recognizing that the program had amassed a …
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Book #181 of 2025: Ripley’s Game by Patricia Highsmith (The Ripliad #3) On a plot level, this third Tom Ripley novel plays out similarly to the first two, seeing our sociopathic protagonist get involved in yet another illegal enterprise that seems like it could have been avoided, whereupon he’s eventually driven to murder, dispose of …
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Indiana Jones was the second in a new feature I’m calling Film Franchise Fridays, where I pick a movie series and watch one picture a week until the end. Before that was Jason Bourne, and up next after the holiday will probably be The Matrix (so far all examples where I know I’ve missed at …
Movie #24 of 2025: Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny (2023) Never say never in Hollywood, but the press statements from star Harrison Ford and current Lucasfilm owner Disney have all indicated that this fifth Indiana Jones movie is meant to stand as the final entry in that long-running saga, which began four decades …
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Book #180 of 2025: The Good, the Bad, and the Uncanny by Simon R. Green (Nightside #10) One of the weaker entries in this 2000s urban fantasy series, which is unfortunate, since it also directly sets up the endgame and includes the deaths of some fairly major recurring characters. But plotwise, this is a mess. …
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TV #55 of 2025: 12 Monkeys, season 1 There’s a fun Fringe vibe running through the first year of this Syfy program, and not only because Kirk Acevedo is around in a supporting role. Like that earlier show, it also offers a story that deepens as it goes along and starts digging into the personal …
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