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Category: reviews

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 Review

Due to me and my husband living in different cities now, it has become quite hard for us to go to movie premieres. I had planned to go visit him on the premiere day of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 so we could watch together, but life happened and we ended up watching it on the weekend. It was fine, though, because our country got to see the movie earlier than most of other countries (including the US), so I still think that’s a win(?)

So anyway… In this second installment of the Guardians of the Galaxy, the team is already fully established as ‘the guardians’. At the beginning of the movie, they are on a mission of protecting the Sovereign’s batteries from a monster who is trying to stole them. They succeed and in turn of their service, the Sovereign hand Nebula over to them. She had become a prisoner after trying to steal the batteries. The Guardians then flee, but unbeknownst to the rest of them, Rocket stole some of the batteries. On their way home, they are attacked by the Sovereign’s fleet but they are saved by a stranger. Turns out, the stranger is Peter Quill’s estranged father, Ego the Living Planet. He asks Peter to come home with him to his planet. Peter is skeptic at first, but Gamora convinces him, so Peter, Gamora, and Drax go with Ego while Rocket, Baby Groot, and Nebula are left to fix their broken ship. The Sovereign is still looking for them and they recruit Yondu and his crew to find the Guardians. But then Yondu’s crew betray him and a mutiny breaks out. Yondu, Rocket, Baby Groot, and Kraglin (one of Yondu’s loyal men) team up to escape, while the rest of the Guardians find out who Ego really is and what he really wants.

While Volume 2 is not a huge disappointment, I honestly still like Volume 1 much better. This movie suffers from the ‘personal story’ syndrome, something that has become quite a trend lately (I read about it somewhere but can’t find the link to the article). The visual effects, the jokes, and the characters are perfect, but the story is a little bit off. Also, I haven’t read any Guardians of the Galaxy comic books, but I’ve read in a forum discussion that Peter Quill’s father in the comic books is not Ego the Living Planet, so maybe I should find out why the writer decided so. And I’m very curious how the Guardians will fit in the upcoming Avengers movie! Anybody else feels the same way?

All in all, I’m giving this movie 4 out of 5 stars.

Image via.

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11 May 2017
Books I Finished in February

The reading craze still continues, friends! In February, I read another four books. I’m way ahead of my 2017 Reading Challenge on Goodreads. I even edited it; I changed my goal from reading 12 books this year to reading 20 books. I’m halfway there & super excited. The last time I read this crazily was in 2012, I guess? I don’t know. I may have never even read 12 books in a year. So, let’s do this!

These are the four books I read last month:

1. We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

I received this book a few months ago for the Travelling Novel Challenge. The pace is very slow that I eventually stopped reading after page 20-ish. I like Shirley Jackon’s short story, The Lottery, that I read for a class in college, but reading her longer writing is kind of painful for me (maybe I’m just dumb haha). She took her time to describe everything in such minute details while the main plot itself is actually quite brief. I also found it hard for me to imagine the time and place setting; is it in America or England, 1800s or 1900s? (Again, maybe I’m just dumb.) I also failed to identify the climax. The novel seems to just end right there. Overall, this novel isn’t for me.

2. Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares by Rachel Cohn & David Levithan

I really like Rachel Cohn & David Levithan’s another collaboration, Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist, and I also like its movie adaptation (starring Michael Cera & Kat Dennings, so I had been wanting to read Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares for years. The imported books shops in my city never have it in stock, so when I found out that a translated version of this book has been released, I bought it immediately. Just like Nick & Norah’s, Dash & Lily’s is a simple & sweet story about girl meets boy in a silly setting. Lily is bored during the holidays & his brother suggests that she leaves a journal in a bookshop. The journal, filled with clues & dares, is found by Dash, who decides to take the dare. The journal goes back and forth between the two of them & when they finally meet… nope, they don’t instantly fall in love with each other. Haha! Go read it. You’re gonna like it 😉

3. It’s Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini

I first found out about this novel when I watched its movie adaptation. I read several pages of the ebook (which I pirated… oops!) The story is about a teenage boy who has depression and suicidal thoughts. When he almost jumps off a bridge, he decides that he needs help & then he checks himself in to a mental ward in a hospital. Since I liked it, I decided to order a printed copy. Right after I ordered this book, I found out that the author, Ned Vizzini, committed suicide a few years ago. It broke my heart. And it certainly made the book have deeper meaning and more authentic. Mental health is something that people in my country don’t really pay attention to; even I used to think that people who commit suicide is stupid. I was very, very wrong. More people should read this book to open their mind.

4. Good Omens by Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman

(Technically, I finished this book just a few minutes after midnight on March 1, but… whatever!) I didn’t really know about Terry Pratchett, but I’ve read Neil Gaiman’s Coraline in junior high & really liked it. Good Omens was one of the book that I started reading for a readalong with the NovelTea Book Club, but I didn’t finish it & completely forgot about it. I finally got around to continue reading it last month. It’s very funny! It’s a story about the several days before what is supposed to be the armageddon, but because of some errors made by both the ‘good’ & ‘evil’ the armageddon plan becomes hilariously flawed. The story relies heavily with Christian versions of the apocalypse, but I’m quite familiar with Christian myths (I like myths from different religions and beliefs; they’re fun readings). If you’re not, the book might be a bit confusing, but the footnotes help (or not? :p) & you can just find everything else in Wikipedia.

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It’s halfway through March & I’ve already read two books. I’m on my third one right now, but I have this project with a deadline around the corner, so I may read less this month. It makes me sad. I guess I’ve become an addict at this point!

Hi, I’m Dara, and I’m a book addict.

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8 March 2017
Books I Finished in January

In my previous post, I talked about my goal to read 12 books this year. To make it official, I logged in to my Goodreads account to set my 2017 Reading Challenge. I checked my Currently Reading shelf & I’m very embarrassed to say that I had nine books there. Five of them are the ones I started reading in 2013 & 2014. They’ve been sitting in my Currently Reading for more than three years! That’s how bad of a reader I’ve become. So in January, I read like crazy. I read whenever I had the chance. I read while eating, before going to bed, and even while watching TV (multitasking, yo!). I managed to finish four of them. They are all the more recent ones; the ones I started reading last year. I figured it would take longer time to finish the ones I had abandoned for years because I might have forgotten the story so I would need to re-read at least a few chapters back.

Alright. So here they are:

1. The Lola Quartet by Emily St John Mandel

I just realised that I’ve never written my review for Station Eleven by Emily St John Mandel. I don’t know why I haven’t done that because I really liked that book & it was one of the most amazing & well-written books I’ve ever read. Station Eleven was my very first Emily St John Mandel’s book, so naturally I looked for her other books and my next choice fell upon The Lola Quartet. It’s a story about four high school friends who were in a jazz quartet. On the last day of their high school, they played a concert on the back of a truck. That was the last time Gavin, a member of the quartet, saw his girlfriend, Anna. Ten years later, Gavin sees a photograph of a little girl who looks like him and has Anna’s surname. Gavin tried to find out what really happened these past ten years and why his fellow quartet members keep it a secret all these years.

The written style is as beautiful as that of Station Eleven. The story is entirely different because there is no worldwide catastrophe in The Lola Quartet, unlike in Station Eleven; there are only personal disasters and how growing up can be very different for everyone. Ditching the traditional structure of narrative, both Station Eleven and The Lola Quartet are more like recounts rather than narratives. Reading these two feels like reading someone’s diary. It’s very flat, yet (again) very beautifully written so it broke my heart anyway. Not recommended if you want more dramatic conflicts.

2. Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

I ditched this book after reading about 85% of it for a very silly reason: I don’t like how Jacob (our main character) is going to leave his parents. See, this is perhaps the reason why most heroes in stories are orphaned. Parents are a burden. I’m not very comfortable reading about a young character goes on a journey to fight evil while their parents wait at home, scared shit about their kid’s well-being. But I finished it anyway, for the sake of eliminating it from my Currently Reading. The story is very good and interesting. The idea is quite fresh, including that idea of the hero having both parents alive. I don’t like the part where Jacob falls in love with his grandfather’s old girlfriend, though (yeah they’re the same age now but I still think that’s kinda creepy LOL).

3. Filosofi Kopi by Dee Lestari

Oh look… Ungil!

Dee Lestari is a prominent author in my country. All her books are best sellers. The most famous is perhaps the Supernova series, a series I tried to read once but couldn’t because it was ‘too hard’ for me who is not really into ‘heavy literature’ (get it?). I’ve only read one more book by Dee and that was Recto Verso, which is a short stories collection. It tore my heart apart and broke it into pieces because the stories are all heart-wrenching. I picked Filosofi Kopi because it is another short stories collection and I felt that I wasn’t ready for a book-length-story-commitment so short stories were nice at that time. Not as wonderful as Recto Verso, though. There are only a few stories I like, the rest is just so-so (I’m sorry!)

4. Corat-Coret di Toilet by Eka Kurniawan

This one is also a short stories collection. I’ve read another collection by Eka Kurniawan, entitled Perempuan Patah Hati yang Kembali Menemukan Cinta Melalui Mimpi, and really liked it so I tried reading another one. Corat-Coret di Toilet is, however, not as good as Perempuan Patah Hati (the title is very long!). Eka Kurniawan is a well-known author; some of his books have been translated and published in English. You can find them at Amazon. Just search for his name.

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Now I still have five books to cross off from my Currently Reading list. I’m gonna do it. I know I can do it!

Dara | Bloglovin’ | Instagram | Twitter | Facebook

9 February 2017
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Movie Review

Rogue One hasn’t even been in the cinema for one week and yet I have seen it twice. TWICE! That’s how obsessed I am. That’s how awesome it is. That’s how wonderful it is to be alive in this era; an era in which we get one Star Wars movie each year.

That’s why no matter how I try, I don’t think this post will be spoiler-free. I’M STILL TOO EXCITED!

As I said in the previous post, I knew next to nothing about Rogue One before watching it on its premier date. Turns out, it wasn’t a big deal at all. When I went to watch it for the second time, I brought along my little sister who hasn’t watched any Star Wars movie. She asked a few questions during the movie, but overall the story is very easy to follow.

Rogue One was based on that one line in the crawl at the opening of A New Hope. It tells a story about how the Rebellions get a hold on the Death Star plans. It also explains why Death Star has a ridiculous flaw in its design. One of the scientists who help to build the Death Star is Galen Erso. At the beginning of the movie, he was living in hiding with his family, but he was caught. His wife was killed and his young daughter escaped. He surrendered then agreed to work on the Death Star. He intentionally put that flaw as a revenge. When the Death Star is almost finished, he sends a message to Saw Gerrera and his daughter, Jyn Erso, telling them about the flaw. She then sets off on a mission to steal the plan from the Empire’s data bank (or sort of; I forget the name lol). They successfully get the plan and transmit it to the Rebellions before they… *SPOILER!!!!* are blown up by the Death Star, along with the whole planet. The movie ends with Darth Vader chases after the rebels who retrieve the plans then hand them to (young!) Princess Leia; just a few minutes before the opening scene of A New Hope. (I’m not gonna talk about how I squealed like a little girl when I saw young Princess Leia.)

Saying this movie is amazing is perhaps a great understatement. Because it’s beyond amazing. I’m mesmerised by how modern technology can make this movie possible, what with Tarkin and Leia, while also maintain silly low-tech things that we can see in the original trilogy, e.g. wired headphones. I also love how they kill everyone while also give each death a meaning. They all die for a better future. That last scene on the beach when Jyn and Cassian hug is so beautifully wrecking. We can see how deep their love for each other is; they just met, then they decided to trust & fight alongside each other.

Rogue One is 100% heartbreaking, yet you’ll love it. You will absolutely love it.

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19 December 2016
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them Movie Review

Yesterday, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them premiered in my country. As usual, Afief and I went to the premier. We got quite nice seats, and since we went to the earliest show at 11.30 am, there were no noisy school kids. Very nice!

In case you didn’t know, this movie is based on the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, a (fictional) school textbook used in the Care for Magical Creatures class in Hogwarts. The book is more like an encyclopedia of magical creatures with their information, such as where to find them (hence the title) and how to take care of them. The book was (fictitiously) written by Newt Scamander. The movie storyline is about Newt Scamander’s journey around the world, researching for the book.

The story opens with Newt arriving in New York in 1926. He carries a briefcase with him, which contains quite a lot of magical creatures. He meets a male no-maj (ugh what a dreadful word!) named Jacob Kowalski in an incident when a niffler escaped from his briefcase and ran into a bank. Before Newt can obliviate Jacob, he escaped carrying his briefcase. Turns out, their briefcases were accidently switched. When Jacob arrives at home, he notices that there’s something strange with the briefcase and opens it, releasing several of the magical creatures. Meanwhile, Newt is captured and taken by an agent of MACUSA (Magical Congress of the USA), Porpentina “Tina” Goldstein. After realising that the briefcase was switched, Newt and Tina go to Jacob’s apartment but they are too late. Jacob has fainted, his apartment blown apart, and the briefcase has been left opened. Newt and Tina, accompanied by Jacob and Queenie (Tina’s sister), have to find all the escaped beasts while also deal with the growing darkness engulfing New York.

After the Pottermore-hype a few years back, I felt that JK Rowling was milking money from Harry Potter franchise until the very last drop. Then news came out that Fantastic Beasts was going to be adapted into a movie and I thought “How do you make a movie based on an encyclopedia?” and how greedy JK Rowling had become these past years. Well, let’s just say that I owe Ms Rowling a million apology, because Fantastic Beasts hands down blew my mind!

Even though the story was set in the past, I feel that it is very refreshing. Along the years, we followed Harry Potter’s growing up from a pre-teen into a young adult. We basically grow up with him. We identified with him. But we’re adults now and Harry will always be 17 (or 36 if we count the epilogue; early 40s if we count The Cursed Child). Fantastic Beasts shows us the wizarding world, though old, from a whole new perspective that we haven’t seen before: the adult world. Here we see adult wizards and witches in their working world: working as aurors, working behind the desk, making coffees, etc. Gone is the teenage world with hormones and angst; it is replaced with the world of adults with responsibilities. Also, the original story also adds up a point. With Harry Potter series, we already knew the stories from the novels, so we compared the films and the books. Fantastic Beasts has an original story, thus it is quite unpredictable. Although I like spoilers, I still think it’s fun to watch unpredictable movies. I didn’t know anything about it before watching besides that Newt Scamander is researching for his book, that he goes to the USA, and that his briefcase starts a disturbance to the wizarding community there. I didn’t know what evil would appear as the ‘bad guy’ in this movie. I left the theater with a smile on my face because I realised how wrong I was to expect less than spectacular.

In conclusion, it’s a very good movie. It has the witty jokes the Harry Potter series offered, it has interesting female characters (the President is a POC female!), and it shows the other side of the wizarding world we’ve never seen before. I can’t wait for the rest of the series (there’ll be four more films).

Have you seen Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them? Do you like it? Tell me!

Second image via.
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17 November 2016