Green_Wolf Reviews

The Wheel of Time (2021– )

This is painful to watch, read the novels instead!

[3/10 · 19 October 2023]

I've managed to see all episodes in season one and the two first episodes of season two.

First I want to say that I've read all the books twice and liked them very much.

I also understand that a TV-adaption seldom can do the original novels justice.

But this adaption is just too painful to watch.

It starts with terrible casting. Many of the actors just don't fit the story line. It's obvious the casting wasn't done by anyone actually reading the novels.

Already in episode one we have the small isolated village up in the mountains which have a nice politically correct diversity of race and ethnicity. Then it continues like that.

The story line has changed and now makes no sense at all. It's actually quite impossible to understand what's happening and why.

It's obvious the creators of the TV adaption have ignored any advice co-writer Brandon Sanderson might have given them in his role as a consulting producer.

Brandon is known for his complex and intricate plot structures, building of character depth and well laid out and logically coherent story-lines with no loop holes.

This adaption relates very little to these concepts.

I sincerely hope they won't make a season three.

If you haven't started to see the TV-adaption yet, I recommend you forget it was ever created and read the novels by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson instead.

Saving 80,000 Gold in Another World for my Retirement (2023)

Easily one of the best Animes of all time!

[10/10 · 3 April 2023]

The series had a very strange but also alluring title, so I thought of trying the it out.

It turned out to be one of the most hilarious, funny, but at the same time thoughtful and profound amines I've seen in a long time.

It borrows the theme of building a trading business between parallel worlds from the "The Merchant Princes" series by Charles Stross. It then applies the lead role of traveler on a very different, young and energetic Japanese woman named Mitsuha.

At first glance this may look like "shoujo anime" for girls, but very soon our heroine learns she need to take a genuine course in how to handle weapons and build a relation with those who can supply adequate protection in a world both similar and at the same time very different from our own.

I think the twelve episodes makes for a complete series, but I sincerely hope it will be greenlighted for a second season!

Monster Hunter (2020)

Better than expected

[7/10 · 19 August 2022]

Being an adaption of a video game I had no expectations on this movie. It turned out to be quite good.

The introductory scenes was not at all what I expected and I quite liked the the main part of the movie which contained decent enough interaction between Artemis and Hunter.

Sadly you need to have a standard Hollywood action ending in order to get funding to do these kind of movies. Otherwise I would have given it a higher rating.

I saw it in 3D on a 43 inch screen. It might not give the same impression if you only see it in 2D.

Why, o why have have they not developed UHD 3D - this movie would have benefited so much with a higher resollution in 3D!

Singularity (I) (2017)

I'm not sure what to make of this movie

[5/10 · 3 November 2017]

The two older actors are veterans in the business and the young main actors are quite good looking and show some talent.

There are some nicely done shots in this movie, obviously the camera crew are professionals. VisualFX, SoundFX and music are on par with with large studio productions. Film editing have been done to get a slower tempo than most current movies, but is also professionally done.

So what's the problem?

I think it's the script and the director. In one scene our young heroes seem stiff and cold, in the next one they are massively overplaying emotions. Then they are stiff and cold again. Repeat. Although the main story line is OK, there are plenty of stupid lines, some of them repeated several times.

I would recommend this movie for a rainy evening when you feel like watching a slow-tempo B-movie where everything except the script is actually a first class production.

Containment (2016)

Nice to see Cladia Black as main cast again!

[9/10 · 20 April 2016]

The series follows a class of eleven year olds and their teacher, a pregnant woman, two policemen and what seem to be some kind of female IT-consultant during an epidemic that breaks out in Atlanta. It gives a good view into the early peaceful stages of the epidemic but gives more than a hint that the situation will spiral out of control quite quickly.

It's nice to see Claudia Black among the main cast in the role as Dr.Sabine Lommers and the rest of the cast is quite good as well.

The first episode is mostly used to give a background to what will be happening and things proceed quite slow. In episode two things are starting to heat up and we start to understand why the series is called "Containment". The feeling of being "trapped" starts to set in...

I have read several reviews which are critical to the show. What most of them seem to be missing is that this show is "realistic" and that things proceed in a real-life kind of manner. The people are actually acting as they would in a real situation where there are no Hollywood heroes.

Is the series "stereotyping, racism, & fear-mongering against immigrants"? I would say no. Everyone infected are treated in the same way according to standard containment procedures. The place where the virus is thought to originate from is one of few known places to have meddled with biological warfare - and they currently have many internal factions which might want to do something like this. The persons from this place act as I believe they would act.

Is the bad looking plastic protective gear used by the police realistic? I'm not from the US so maybe the the US police have better equipment, but here in Europe the equipment used is what I would expect to be used.

Regarding the lack of "filter masks to filter out viruses in the air or fluids". The type of masks used are not really for protecting the user of the mask from viruses or bacteria, but the persons around you from being contaminated when you sneeze. NIOSH approved N99 filter masks are not commonly used by the police and it's unlikely they would have many of these.

Contrary to what many people seem to believe, true "Biosafety level 4 containment rooms" which you see in Hollywood productions are really, really scarce. In the whole world there are maybe thirty something BSL4-labs, but it so happens that two of these are in Atlanta. They are however not located in a public hospital but at the state university and at the CDC facilities.

Star Trek: Horizon (2016)

A worthy "closing out of open threads" for the TV-series "Star Trek Enterprise"

[8/10 · 6 March 2016]

This a non-profit movie made through a Kickstarter campaign, and does specifically NOT include any actors from the commercial Star Trek movies or series.

Done with a budget of only $22.600 (minus the Kickstarter share) this movie makes a good job at closing out the story threads left hanging after the cancellation of the TV-series Enterprise in 2005. The story and writing is quite good and the acting ranges from sufficient to good. The special effects, sound and music is of commercial quality. If you cannot tolerate the use of "lense flares" and "soft-focus haze" you might be a bit irritated due to its frequent use, though.

In contrast to some other fan films they took the time to edit the whole movie together properly (looking at you "Renegades"). I could only find one or two occurrences where they could have fit the pieces better together, and this wasn't due to "missing scenes" - but rather they unnecessarily repeated some information.

I give the movie 8/10.

Star Trek: Renegades (2015–2017)

Interesting concept which I guess is made as a pitch for a new TV-series

[7/10 · 16 August 2015]

This a non-profit movie made through Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns, including several actors from the commercial Star Trek movies and series.

I'm not sure what to make of it. It's obviously much too good to be a "fan movie" but not good enough to be a Box Office Hit. Maybe it fits as a "Pilot" or "Pitch" for a TV-Series? The movie is very uneven. I would say ratings for different scenes range all they way from 3 to 9 out of 10. The transition between scenes could sometimes be smoother and some scenes also seem a bit "out of place".

The acting of the Star Trek alumni in the movie is generally good and I must say that the acting skills of Adrienne Wilkinson has improved from the clips seen in the supporter forums "exclusive clips area". It's actually quite good in the final movie. The casting of other characters is uneven with several persons fitting their roles and others obviously not.

I give Special FX 7/10. Most of the to times they are on par with commercial productions but the movie would for example have been better of without "the fire" in a few scenes in the beginning of the movie.

Background music is fitting most of the time, I would say 7/10. Sound FX are also good, as long as you can stand the sound of spaceships in outer space where there's no sound.

The concept behind the the movie is quite interesting and might, if pitched in the right way, be turned into a TV-series.

From an objective standpoint my overall rating ought to be a notch lower, but because I like the concept I give it 7/10 :-)

The Last Ship (2014–2018)

Good concept, but non-existent screenplay and execution

[5/10 · 26 August 2014]

I love the concept of the series, but after watching the pilot I found so many Errors that a "top 100 hundred list" wouldn't cover half of them.

In overall I would give the concept a "ten". The world's been affected by a virus which kills off most of the population. A US destroyer on a faraway mission have been spared and have some scientists aboard which might be able to create a vaccine.

The budget is good enough, but unfortunately the guys writing the screenplay seem to have done so during a coffee break while they were thinking about anything else except this show. Then no one reviewed the screenplay and it went directly to production without any modifications at all. I would rate the screenplay very close to a "zero".

The execution in part one is quite bad. However, many fantastic series have started of in a similar fashion and have gotten better after a season or two. I hope this series will follow the same pattern - and that they start to ignore what the screenplay writers give them - and start to follow the story in the book instead.

I will give the show one more chance by looking at episode two, but frankly I don't have any expectations after watching the first episode.