Summer 2019 round-up
10 years of J.J. Abrams’s Star Trek, Disney/Marvel and the movies, music and TV I’ve enjoyed these past four months
Been a while since my last round-up hasn’t it? Well, for those who don’t visit Multiversity Comics (and you should, we’re anti-clickbait), here’s what I was up to during May, June, July and August.
First up, the start of May marked the tenth anniversary of J.J. Abrams’s Star Trek, and MC, which was founded to post an apologetic for X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I used the opportunity to promote Troye Sivan’s music.
I also wrote a retro-review of Star Trek’s prequel comic, and about the fallout of the movie on my personal blog here:
The We Want Comics column I curate continues to go strong twice a month, here were the ones I actually wrote or contributed to:
My TV recaps continued regularly, as they shifted from the conclusion of Legends of Tomorrow season 4 to Big Hero 6 season 2, and the resumption of my Gargoyles retrospective. I was also part of this fun roundtable for all the CW’s DC shows in the run-up to ‘Crisis on Infinite Earths’:
As news manager, I continued the coordination and coverage of so many breaking news stories before, during and after San Diego Comic-Con and the D23 Expo, including five obituaries — which leads me to the return of my essay writing. First up in August, I marked five years since the death of Robin Williams. I’ve always wanted to pay tribute to him every passing anniversary, and through the prism of our mutual fandom, I was finally able to do it:
(Writing this was cathartic: after all these years of feeling disbelief at his passing or how many years it’s been, I feel I’ve finally come to terms with him being gone.)
Then, I began to work out my love-hate relationship with Marvel and Disney, marking 10 years of their deal and my disappointment with things like the end of the Sony Spider-Man deal, how they turned the fandom against the Inhumans, and the monopolisation they’ve pursued and encouraged:
That said, I can’t deny I’m excited about the projects Disney do decide to make, hence these two blog posts:
How have things been personally for me you ask? Well the usual, enjoying lots of movies, music and TV. I must say, Janelle Monae (and Grace Carter, and Lupita Nyong’o!) at Wembley Arena may have been the best gig I’ve ever been to, it must’ve been like seeing James Brown in their prime:
Two cool services I’ve started to use: Ecosia, a tree planting charity that operates a search engine — every search helps them plant more trees, which is essential to say the least. I’ve also started using Cinema Paradiso, which offers far more classic films than any streaming service ever could.
As always, feel free to support me by donating to my PayPal or buying me a Ko-Fi. I’m gonna leave you now with a smattering of tweets about the stuff I’ve enjoyed these past four months:
- Movies: Detective Pikachu, John Wick 3, Aladdin, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Toy Story 4, Spider-Man: Far From Home, Always Be My Maybe (follow here for more films I saw at home)
- Music: Kim Petras, Carly Rae Jepsen, Aurora, Bruce Springsteen, Sigrid, Tegan and Sara, MUNA, Shura, Lizzo (oh my God why I have not tweeted about Charli? Bop of the summer), Pvris
- TV: Dark season 2, Stranger Things 3, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, 3% season 3, High Seas, If I Hadn’t Met You, Leila, 3Below, Typewriter, Dollar, Tuca and Bertie (RIP), Good Omens, What We Do in the Shadows, Twelve Forever, My Brilliant Friend (and various other Italian series including The Miracle), This Way Up, Game of Thrones:
RIP GOT, at least we got the prequel, Amazon’s Lord of the Rings, Conan, The Dark Tower and Wheel of Time, HBO/HBO Max’s Watchmen, Who Fears Death, The Untamed and Dune: The Sisterhood, Netflix’s The Witcher, Sandman, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Shadow and Bone and Chronicles of Narnia, CBS All Access’s Star Trek series, TNT’s The Broken Earth, Apple TV+’s Foundation, Hulu’s Vampire Chronicles and Throne of Glass, and Disney+’s…
