The snap of a freshly starched karate gi

Rewatched feature-length spin-off "Cowboy Bebop: Knockin' On Heaven's Door". Listened to the fourth and final box set of "UNIT: Nemesis". Don't wanna talk about those. Instead, today's topic is -

A 2025 Belgian flick about a retired male spy who suspects foul play - and old enemies - when a young woman goes missing? Cool! An homage to the ultra-sexy, ultra-stylish Euro thrillers of the '60s (the poster clearly references legendary Italian comic "Diabolik")? Even cooler! Shame they push the level of sadism into the horror realm. Definite Giallo vibes. And as for the level of surrealism...every time you think it's starting to makes sense, there's another inversion of reality. Then another, then another, then another. It's fucking mental, basically. A unique viewing experience for sure, with some cinematic techniques that genuinely wow, but by the end I was sick of all of the shenanigans. Not to mention all of the violence against women, however symbolic or illusory. The fact a chick is wearing a rubber mask doesn't make it any less disturbing when some dude takes a knife or whatever to her face. I wish they'd played it straight. For a great spin on an ageing female spy, check out "Velvet" from Image Comics.

2, 2, 7, 3, 500, 18, 5, 28

RS2 and I finished our rewatch of Season 2 of "Blake's 7" on Blu-ray. Alas, S3 won't be out until December (sources say).

I kept this nearly 500-page current-day spy thriller from my late father's library because the central spy is also supposed to be an art restorer. Said character did zero restoration in "The Other Woman", but given that it's the 18th(!) novel in the series, I guess the author can be forgiven for running out of ways to link preserving paintings with foiling enemy agents. Or, in this case, sniffing out a possible mole with a possible connection to the infamous Cambridge Five. Despite the size of the book, the pages turned quickly and every chapter left me wanting to know more, even if "T/O/W" never felt like anything but premium-quality genre content. 

28 years after calling time on the wonderful, WONDERFUL "Calvin And Hobbes" newspaper strip, cartoonist Bill Watterson released this collaboration. An storybook rather than a comic, it is short, dark, ugly, depressing, puzzling (on multiple levels) and just profoundly underwhelming. "C&H" still rules, though.

I had a movie day

Watched four of the buggers in 16 hours. They went from educational to light-hearted to crazy fun to deeply creepy. From artist biopic to kids' flick to scifi sequel to the hundredth (200th? 300th?) possible explanation for the Jack The Ripper murders.

Incredible US street photographer whose enormous body of work - in B&W, colour and on 8mm film - from the 1940s-80s serves as a portrait of a country striving to find itself, sometimes painfully. The doco features perceptive observations from his contemporaries and discussion of key influences, galleries, exhibitions and photobooks, as well as noting arguably problematic aspects of the man himself. 

Hard to resist the cast, splendid sets, deliberate silliness and jungle adventure. Impossible to resist, in fact. The level of background detail is dazzling - you can tell the animators/model makers/set designers, etc. still put their best efforts into items that only appear on screen for seconds, e.g. a joke newspaper. On that note, the CGI is smoothly integrated, rather than trying to wow the audience on its own.

Outdoing the fab original, "Megan 2.0" ramps up the chaos, conspiracy, comedy (that Kate Bush cover was gold!), killbots and - by extension - justified technofear about our modern world. It literally goes to places you do not expect. The soundtrack is a blast and also deserves praise for incorporating the "Knight Rider" theme. Oh, and actors Ivanna Sakhno and Jemaine Clement are especially good.

This C-grade poster is laughably misleading for a fillum consisting mostly of (well-written) seated conversations. Which is not to say "Ripper Untold" lacks disturbing bits. The makers use their low budget to show just enough gore to horrify in the same way they show just enough period trappings for believability...which is a word I wouldn't necessarily apply to the big reveal. On the movie poster again, given that "Ripper Untold" is both sympathetic to the social inequalities of the time and attempts to humanise the victims, the sensationalised image and tag lines do it a real disservice.

Destruction, defibrillation and, er, Dodgson

COMIC COVER OF THE WEEK

"Alice Forever After #4" by InHyuk Lee.

Fairly original and highly atmospheric take on Carroll's beloved characters. Comic itself is tempting, but I'll wait until it's collected into graphic-novel form.

SONG OF THE WEEK

"Defibrillator" by The Snuts (Scotland).

The kind of jingle-jangle guitar pop I was mad for in my 20s. Smart lyrics. Doesn't outstay its welcome. What's a "snut"? Maybe I shouldn't ask!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GugxzJQdT-o

MANGA OF THE WEEK

"Destroy All Humans...They Can't Be Regenerated", Volumes 1-6.

Sweet romance/heroic rise set amid the combo-heavy metagame of late-'90s "Magic: The Gathering". Not even joking. Loving this with every fibre of my being.

Bring back karate chops!

Expert plate-spinning (water-treading?) from BF. The Axons, while brought to life surprisingly well in the audio medium, were ultimately dealt with too easily. Part 4's twist of a certain being's involvement in the alien invasion of Earth was spoilt by the fact I'd already seen the cover of the fourth box set - but that ain't Big Finish's fault. On to the finale!

Comfort reading you can smash in a sitting, as I did. Whenever I engage with "The Five Doctors" in any form, I'm reminded that Uncle Terrance was a grandmaster of both "Who" lore and clever plotting. Fellow Target novelisation fans will know what I mean when I say that every embellishment of what we saw on screen remains a tiny delight.

A phrase I'm going through

Often, the titles of these blog entries are just arrangements of words that tickled my fancy enough for me to write them down. Could be something I heard or read, or that just popped into my head. Might rhyme like that. Might not. Could be a Q. If I feel it's warranted, I'll wrap 'em in quote marks.

I have too many of these jottings at present. More than I can use. So I'm burning a bunch below, where they still won't be explained. That's right, this is a list of meaningless titles for never-to-be-written blogs! Aren't you lucky?

* Twenty-sided vice

* Umami hunter

* "There are still ghosts feasting at the table all these centuries later"

* Optimistically whistling the theme from "Minder"

* Pattern-matching machines

* The judge won't budge

* How many zen masters does it take to change a lightbulb?

* "She's a whole deck of wild cards"

* Keyclick symphony orchestra

* Robble, robble

* Canon of worms

* I flew to the wrong country

* Onion-wrapped Flying Dutchman

* "We watch the portraits watching us"

* Hoot and/or holler

* A Golden Age of Iron Age archaeology

* "How do you know when you've run out of invisible ink?"

The threat of mirror bacteria

On the latest episode of "The Doctor Who Show", in their regular series The List Makers (as opposed to "The Myth Makers", casuals), champion Aussie podders Rob and Dave presented their individual Top 5 "Who"-related autobiographies/biographies. It made me ponder mine. In no particular order, I'd go with:

* "Who On Earth Is Tom Baker?" by TB

* "Blue Box Boy" by Matthew Waterhouse (aka Adric)

* "Who And Me" by Barry Letts (producer)

* "Script Doctor" by Andrew Cartmel (script editor), AND

* "Still Getting Away With It" by Nicholas Courtney (aka The Brigadier).

Between them, the lads mentioned all five of those, although I believe NC's was a "just missed the cut" dealio. More interestingly, they both had at No. 1 on their list the bio "The Life And Scandalous Times Of John Nathan-Turner" by Richard Marson, which was later expanded and retitled "Totally Tasteless".

Based on their double rave, I am now on the hunt for a copy!

(I also realise I badly need to read some memoirs by women involved with the program. The above is a literary sausage party.)