Birmingham ComicCon Saturday 21st November 2015

Last weekend I went with my son and some friends to the Birmingham ComicCon at the NEC. It felt a little bit smaller than the London equivalent and there were some good cosplay costumes but not quite the same extent as the London event. The shops were pretty similar, Tokyo Toys were there (my son's favourite) as well as CEX. I spent a bit of time in the Comic Village. I bought a few things but didn't go mad. I didn't take many photographs and I didn't take any photos of the cosplay costumes, which I sort of regret and sort of feel that it might have been uncomfortable to have asked anyway.
Despite not taking many photos, here are the ones I did manage to take from the Steampunk zone.

Terminator Salvation (2009)

I watched this film this week and have to confess to enjoying it more than I thought I would. Don't misunderstand, it is nothing like as good or watchable as the first Terminator. However, it was quite alright as an action film. It was a bit daft and unbelievable but then that's what science fiction can be like and is in many ways part of the charm. So, I'd recommend a watch of this film for Terminator fans. I haven't seen Terminator Genysis so not sure how it compares to that film.

Paris attacks on Friday 13th

Horrible.
Horrible.
Horrible.

What an awful end to the evening. Those cold, calculating bastards who attacked innocent civilians on a night out in Paris deserve to be hunted, captured and put in prison for the rest of their lives. It was a shocking display of cowardice and evil - firing a weapon at unarmed people who can't fight back. What a bunch of cowards. One of the less shocking images below. It's just wrong to see bodies on the pavement outside restaurants and bars.
I was watching TV with my wife in bed when reports started coming in. We stayed up watching the news until after 2am. The death count kept creeping up.

Nikita

I watched this film last night and really enjoyed it. I like Luc Besson films. Leon was another great film of his that I enjoyed. Nikita is a wild woman who is a drug addict that kills a cop but is given a second chance to work for the French government as some sort of assassin. A bit of an unbelievable plot however, the acting is great and direction even better, The story is fast paced and the style has been imitated but not bettered.
I haven't seen any of the TV series but I don't expect it to be as good as the original film.

RIP Philthy Animal Taylor

I was shocked to hear of the death of the ex-Motorhead drummer Phil Taylor. He was only 61. The first album I ever bought was Bomber on which he drummed. A great musician. Sad day.

Godzilla (2014)

I watched this with my son recently, last weekend. It told the story from a new perspective. An American family (with one child, a boy) living in Japan are split apart by an apparent accident at a nuclear plant. The parents both work at the plant but when what seems to be an Earthquake ruptures the reactor, the mother is locked in the exhaust tunnels and doomed to a radioactive death.
Years later the boy is a bomb disposal expert returning from a war zone. He is living in the US but is called to return to Japan to get his father out of jail. The nuclear plant is a restricted no-go area but the father keeps trying to get back in to find out what really happened. He has information about the wave form at the time.
It turns out that the wave form is electrical pulsing and a monster appears. Godzilla is a good guy and fights this new monster in the US. It's a good story and there is more to it than I can do justice here. It is a good film and I'd recommend it to fans of the monster movie genre.
There was a Godzilla film made in 1998. That one was poor compared to this one. The monster in the 2014 movie is a return to the original model of the Godzilla monster. The 1998 version made Godzilla look much too much like a T-Rex.

Charity shop purchases

Visiting the shops yesterday my wife and I picked up a few DVDs to watch. We bought a couple of Father Ted DVDs, a hilarious series. We love watching Father Ted, always something to cheer you up in Father Ted.
I also picked up a copy of the new Godzilla film and Luc Besson's Nikita, a film I don't think I have ever seen but one that spawned a lot of copycat films with a female assassin as the lead character. I liked Leon by Luc Besson and I think Nikita was made before Leon.