Favourite TV Shows #9: Cowboy Bebop

I've got a lot of anime to catch up on, but out of the ones I have seen, my favourite has to be Cowboy Bebop. It's a science fiction, a western, a film noir - it crosses so many genres that the show itself even boasts that it's "a new genre unto itself".

Taking place in a late 21st century setting where the Earth is uninhabitable following a disaster, and humanity has colonised the rest of the Solar System. Due to the rise in crime, the ISSP (Inter Solar System Police) have established a scheme where licensed bounty hunters (Cowboys) can bring in wanted criminals for rewards. 

One such Cowboy is Spike Spiegel. Once an enforcer for a syndicate on Mars, Spike is now a laid back bounty hunter leading an aimless life aboard the Bebop, a converted trawler operated by Jet Black. Formerly a police officer, Jet also hunts bounties, but fancies himself a Renaissance Man and serves as an interesting foil to Spike. As the show goes on, Spike and Jet are joined by three more characters: Faye Valentine, an amnesiac con artist; an eccentric teenage hacker known only as 'Radical Edward'; and Ein, a genetically-engineered Welsh Corgi who possibly possesses human intelligence.

The show follows these characters as they travel the Solar System in search of lucrative bounties, while also trying to avoid the threat of starvation and the individuals' troubled pasts - especially Spike's nemesis Vicious.

There is a great mix of comedy and drama, the animation brings out fast-paced action, and I love the imagination behind the sci-fi concepts. Not to mention the jazz and blues-dominated soundtrack bringing it all together.

My favourite episode is probably 'Cowboy Funk', in which Spike pursues the bounty on a villain known as 'The Teddy Bomber' but ends up feuding with Cowboy Andy, a rival bounty hunter who embraces the Cowboy aspect of his work.

The series is currently available on Netflix UK, and I highly recommend that you watch it. Whether you prefer to watch anime in Japanese or English, both versions are fantastic. In fact, I'd say that English version is superior, thanks to the fantastic voice of Steven Blum as Spike.

See you, Space Cowboy...

Favourite TV Shows #10: The Young Ones

Although I'm not a university student, I still find this a very enjoyable series. Ben Elton's sitcom follows the lives of four undergraduate students living together: The violent punk Vyvyan, played by Ade Edmondson; the hypocritical, self-proclaimed anarchist Rick, played by Rik Mayall; the depressed and long-suffering hippie Neil, played by Nigel Planer; and the smooth-talking con artist Mike, played by Christopher Ryan.

The characters have some great chemistry. Vyvyan and Rick are always quarrelling with each other when they're not picking on Neil, while Mike remains neutral in all the conflicts and is respected by everybody else - especially Vyvyan, who refers to him as Michael and serves as his right-hand man.

In order to receive a bigger budget, the series is also a variety show, featuring a musical act in every episode, along with a stand-up from Alexei Sayle - who plays the boys' landlord Jerzei Balowski or one of his many identical relatives.

The show's humour is predominately based on slapstick, but there is plenty of surreal humour as well as many fourth wall jokes. Especially with the strong anti-Conservative sentiment it brings out during the height of the Thatcher years. In fact, the series was written as an alternative to the Oxbridge-dominated mainstream comedy of the time.

My favourite episode is 'Bambi' in which the boys are picked to represent their college on University Challenge, playing against an Oxbridge team comprised of Hugh Laurie, Stephen Fry, Emma Thompson, and Ben Elton. It also features a disastrous trip to the launderette, and the answer to important questions such as the world record for most marshmallows stuffed up one nostril.

If you're not a big fan of slapstick, then this isn't for you, but it's one I like to revisit every once in a while.

Favourite TV Shows

I came out of employment recently, and was planning to use it as an opportunity to spend more time on my writing. Unfortunately, that has been kind of slow as well, mainly because I'm a notorious procrastinator (what writer isn't?).

Since I've been spending most of my time on Netflix and Amazon Instant Video, I thought I might do a countdown of my top ten favourite TV shows. Yes, I know I should be getting back to work, but blogging is still writing.

I'll be posting these over the next couple of days, so watch this space.

National Novel Writing Month: My Thoughts

This year, I decided that I was crazy enough to take a shot at an annual event held every November called National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo.

NaNoWriMo is a writing challenge in which you must write 50,000 words in 30 days. It's a well-meaning scheme, and a good premise for a challenge. The novels are not hosted online, but you update your daily word count as you write, aiming to write an average of 1,667 words a day to stay on target. This isn't always easy when you have a job.

So I decided to go for it, with a Prohibition-era gangster story called 'An Empire from Humble Means'.

It was a slow start, but I managed to pick things up as the month went on. Unfortunately, my ideas began to run flat by the final weekend of November, with 34,000 words and a return to my procrastinating habits. That's why I posted those film reviews.

Trying it has made me see the main issue with the challenge; It favours quantity over quality. I feel that a lot of the content in my story will be seen as padding. To be fair, it's a first draft, and there are 'Revision Months' in January and February to tidy it up.

The other problem I have found is that I've got a rather laconic writing style which is more suited to short stories and novellas rather than a full-length novel. In fact, there are a couple of places in the story where I could end it. Perhaps it would work as a serial.

Am I disappointed that I didn't reach the goal? A little. But I'm still glad that I went for it, and I will revisit what I've written at some point. Right now, I want to go back to writing short stories. As for trying again, I probably won't do so immediately. But I will give it another go later down the line.

The Cornetto Trilogy: Final Thoughts

Looking back at Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright's films, I have to say that all three are really good films - yes, even The World's End.

They're all films that you can watch multiple times and will always pick up something new. And that is the mark of excellent writing.

Regardless of the story, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost always provide a great dynamic, and they do their best to give some variety. 

In Shaun of the Dead, Shaun is somewhat mature, but lacks ambition, while Ed is a lot lazier and more vulgar and uncouth. 

In Hot Fuzz, Nicolas Angel is good at police work but is also a socially inept workaholic with no sense of humour, while Danny is more laid back and affable. 

In The World's End, Gary is essentially a perpetually adolescent, blathering screw-up, while Andy is a cynical professional.

In terms of ranking, it's safe to say that Hot Fuzz is the best film in the trilogy, followed by Shaun of the Dead and then The World's End. Despite it's place at the bottom, The World's End is by no means a bad film. I enjoyed it and I can still re-watch it. In fact, it's a much stronger story on the second viewing thanks to the foreshadowing jokes that are used in all three films.

Well, I'd better get back to my writing. I'll see you again soon.

Franchise Reviews: The World's End

Well, 2016 has struck again, and I'm spending it at The World's End with a green Mint Cornetto. This sci-fi comedy is the third and final collaboration between Pegg, Frost, and Wright.

Simon Pegg plays Gary King, the world's oldest adolescent. He seeks to conquer The Golden Mile, an epic 12-stop pub crawl in his former hometown of Newton Haven, and he seeks to conquer it with his childhood friends: Andy Knightley, played by Nick Frost; Steven Prince, played by Paddy Considine; Oliver Chamberlain, played by Martin Freeman; and Peter Page, played by Eddie Marsan.

While his friends are all leading successful adult lives in London, Gary is still the same irresponsible plonker he was at school. They all enjoy seeing each other again, but they grow tired of Gary's antics very quickly (Especially Andy, who wants nothing to do with Gary after an accident 16 years earlier). This changes when they discover that Newton Haven has been invaded by aliens who have replaced the people with androids. Not wanting to arouse suspicion, they decide to carry on with the crawl.

Wait, what?

OK, it's not the best premise. And a lot of people weren't so keen on the role reversal, with Simon Pegg playing the man-child while Nick Frost is more responsible. I suppose it makes a nice change. But then again, Shaun was a man-child character in the first film, but it's different here. And their interactions are still great, along with the other characters. Rosamund Pike appears as Oliver's sister Sam, with whom Gary and Steven competed for affections. Other one-scene wonders include David Bradley as the conspiracy theorist Mad Basil, and Pierce Brosnan as the boys' old schoolmaster Mr Shepherd.

I'd also like to point out that this is certainly the darkest film in the trilogy, with some truly dramatic moments. I can't really say much about that without spoiling it though. Gary tends to blather, but Andy always delivers some snarky comebacks. I guess they wanted to create a different dynamic to avoid becoming formulaic.

Overall, it's not the best film in the series, but it's still worth a couple of viewings.

Franchise Reviews: Hot Fuzz

Well, the police did get involved today. And by that, I mean that I'm taking a look at Pegg, Frost, and Wright's next collaboration; Hot Fuzz. Yesterday's Cornetto was a red strawberry one to represent zombies. Today, we're having a blue classic flavour to represent the police in this buddy cop film.

Simon Pegg plays Nicholas Angel, a high-performing officer in London's Metropolitan Police. In fact, he's so high-performing that he's making everyone else look bad by comparison, so his superiors assign him to a sergeant's position. Unfortunately, this sergeant's position is not in London, but in the village of Sandford in rural Gloucestershire.

Nicholas finds that he isn't accustomed to his surroundings: the local police are lazy, while the Neighbourhood Watch Alliance is more proactive and the village's most wanted criminal is an escaped swan. Inspector Frank Butterman, played by Jim Broadbent, is content to let the NWA run things, and partners Nicholas with his son Danny, played by Nick Frost. Not long afterwards, a serial killer good at staging accidents is on the loose in the village, and Nicholas suspects the charming but sinister supermarket manager Simon Skinner, played by Timothy Dalton.

Once again, Simon and Nick have a great dynamic, but a slightly different one to Shaun of the Dead. Nicholas is a no-nonsense workaholic who can't stop enforcing the law, while Danny more affable but lazy, and is longing for the gunfights and car chases he sees in his favourite action films. Eventually, Nicholas teaches Danny to become a better police officer, while Danny teaches Nicholas to lighten up and relax.

However, there are plenty of other great characters in the film, both in Sandford's police and the Neighbourhood Watch. Timothy Dalton steals the show as Simon Skinner. He says the most sinister and violent things but makes them sound charming. There's also Rafe Spall and Paddy Considine as the 'The Andys', Sandford Police's Criminal Investigation Department. They provide a ton of funny lines, most of which are snarky comments or insults. 

As for Neighbourhood Watch, there seem to be a fair few villains. The vicar is played by Belloq from Raiders of the Lost Ark (Paul Freeman), the hotel keeper is the evil nanny from The Omen (Billie Whitelaw), and the GP is Don Montero from The Mask of Zorro (Stuart Wilson).

There are some really funny scenes, but I don't have time to talk about them all. You just have to see them for yourself. Trust me, it's worth a couple of watches.

That's about it. I'll see you tomorrow for the conclusion. I'm going back to waiting out the apocalypse in the pub. I might do a crawl.

Franchise Reviews: Shaun of the Dead

Right, I'm back. Sorry, there were no Strawberry Cornettos in the shop. No matter, I'm here to discuss the first film in the Cornetto Trilogy: Shaun of the Dead.

Simon Pegg plays Shaun, a man who's almost 30 but has no direction in his life. He's stuck in a dead-end job at an electronics shop, he's distant from his parents, and he doesn't spend enough time with his girlfriend Liz, played by Kate Ashfield. After being dumped, he vows to set things right. Unfortunately, this epiphany happens at the same time as a zombie apocalypse.

Despite this minor setback, Shaun realises that he can prove himself as a responsible man. Accompanied by his vulgar best friend Ed, played by Nick Frost, he aims to rescue his parents and girlfriend and provide them with a sanctuary from the zombies; his local, the Winchester.

Simon and Nick have a great dynamic as Shaun and Ed. Both are lazy and not the brightest, but Shaun is slightly more responsible while Ed is crude and unkempt, spending most of his time playing TimeSplitters 2 (I love that game!) but doing very little in the way of work. Black Books star Dylan Moran and The Office cast member Lucy Davis also appear as Liz's flatmates David and Dianne, while Penelope Wilton and Bill Nighy play Barbara and Phillip, Shaun's mother and stepfather.

The film has a very interesting mix of tones. Taglined as 'A Romantic Comedy. With Zombies', it has plenty of jokes, but the zombies are still wanting to eat your brains and there's plenty of gore. The film even depicts everyday life as zombie-like in the opening, possibly providing a social commentary. The third act especially accentuates the horror element, with most of the laughs uncomfortable at best. It was masterfully done.

The really difficult part is finding which joke was my favourite, whether it involves the scene where they beat the zombie-fied landlord to the tune of 'Don't Stop Me Now', or the morning of the outbreak with a very hungover Shaun oblivious to the desolation around him until he pieces it together through idle channel-surfing. I'll probably say my favourite scene was when they run into Shaun's old friend Yvonne, played by Simon Pegg's former co-star and writer from Spaced, Jessica Hynes. She's leading her own band of survivors played by other sitcom stars.

If not that scene, then Shaun's post-breakup binge with Ed, who's suggested plan of continued drinking for the next day sums up the events of the film. It's one of the many foreshadowing techniques that appears in the whole trilogy.

That's about it. With the state of things this year I'm off to have a nice cold pint and wait for all this to blow over. Hopefully the police won't get involved this time.

At least, not until tomorrow.

Franchise Reviews: The Cornetto Trilogy

It's been a while since I've posted anything on here. I'll say why in due course. But I thought I might decide to do another set of film reviews.

I've done all the Bond films and the original Star Wars trilogy, and this time I've decided to do another favourite series of mine: Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright's Three Flavours Cornetto Trilogy, also known as the Blood and Ice Cream Trilogy.

For those who don't know, this was an informal trilogy of films written by Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright, starring Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, and directed by Edgar wright. The films are not really a series, as they don't follow the same story, but are connected by the production team along with several recurring jokes and themes, most notably the presence of the Cornetto.

The trilogy could be regarded as an offshoot of the crew's previous collaboration, the short-lived Britcom, Spaced. I might as well take the time to discuss that here.

Spaced follows comic artist Tim Bisley and writer Daisy Steiner, played by Simon Pegg and Jessica Hynes, who pretend to be a couple in order to rent a flat. The show mainly follows the fake couple's surreal adventures as they try and figure out what to do with their lives while maintaining their facade in front of their drunken landlady Marsha Klein, played by Julia Deakin.

The other main stars include Nick Frost as Tim's best friend Mike Watt, Mark Heap as fellow resident and eccentric conceptual artist Brian Topp, and Katy Carmichael as Daisy's best friend Twist Morgan.

At the time of writing, you can watch both seasons Spaced on Channel 4's website, and I do recommend them for some bizarre laughs. One notable sequence involves Tim staying up late playing Resident Evil while on Speed, which prompts him to start hallucinating about zombies. Why am I bringing this up? Well, because it was how the trilogy was ultimately conceived.

Anyway, I'll post the first review later today.

In the meantime, want anything from the shop?

A Week at Swanwick

Well, tomorrow morning I'm due back in work after a wonderful week at the Swanwick Writers' Summer School, so I might as well try and write about my experiences. After a promotional email was shared by someone in my writers' group, I decided to attend.

First impressions were great. Upon arriving at the beautiful venue on a sunny Saturday afternoon, I was able to interact and socialise with ease. After settling in, there was a Chairman's welcome followed by an informal reception for new students; the so-called 'White Badgers'. Later that evening I was able to discuss my current projects at an icebreaker event.

The next couple of days were taken up by some very engaging courses, most notably a four-part course on Character Psychology conducted by Steve Hartley. This course discussed things like the types of personalities, the concept of status, the three lives of a person (public, private, and secret), and a look at psychopaths and their behaviours.

There was also a selection of two-part short courses which were run each day. These included: a guide to punctuation and grammar titled 'Eats, Shoots, and Leaves' hosted by Fiona Samuels; a course on the Trickier Parts of Fiction run by Sue Moorcroft, which looked at dialogue, viewpoint, and the process of showing rather than telling; and a look at the drafting process by Bridget Holding, known as 'How to Eat an Elephant'.

In-between courses, there were plenty of opportunities to sit back and write, whether solo or in groups. This is in addition to some of the evening entertainment they have, including a disco, an poetry open mic night, a busker's night, and even a pantomime on the last night.

While I didn't have the energy to try out everything (it is quite tiresome), I picked some interesting pointers, and made a lot of new friends.

I'll certainly be coming back next year.

The Curse of Bully Hayes

Being a writer, I sometimes find that bad films can be a good source of inspiration. Granted, I wouldn't pay anything more than a Netflix subscription to watch them, but when I do, I always try and ask myself what can be improved.

And because one of my current projects is a pirate story, this brings up one Unholy Grail of sorts in the form of Nate and Hayes, a 1983 adventure film starring Tommy Lee Jones in one of his early roles; a highly romanticised portrayal of William "Bully" Hayes, a pirate and smuggler who operated in the South Pacific during the 1850s up until his murder in 1877. In the film, Hayes is providing passage to a missionary named Nathaniel Williamson and his fiancée Sophie, when she is kidnapped by rival pirate Ben Pease. What follows is a traditional swashbuckling adventure with plenty of set pieces (including a rope bridge scene).

While Tommy Jones and the other actors do seem to be enjoying themselves, the story is minimal, the characters are flat, and action set pieces have all been done before (although that is sort of expected in a swashbuckler). It was ultimately a commercial failure, with audiences and critics alike regarding it as a blatant cash-in on the success of Raiders of the Lost Ark. This is where the 'curse' came into play; the film's failure prompted the Hollywood subconsciousness to regard pirate films as box office poison for the next twenty years. It wasn't until Pirates of the Caribbean came along that they changed their attitude. In fact, they were worried that Pirates of the Caribbean wouldn't be successful, and look how that turned out. Unless the fourth sequel scares them back into their shell, that is.

But is the film that horrible? Not really. There just isn't much to it. It's a B-movie, plain and simple. Something to accompany a night of drinking. It was actually the 'curse' that drew me to it.

The film is on currently Netflix, and great for rounding off your bank holiday.