After the sheer brilliance of Evil Dead Rise(let's be honest, there's never been a bad Evil Dead movie), not one but two continuations of the saga are being worked on.
Evil Dead Burn is now due out this July 22 and now it's been announced that work has begun on Evil Dead Wrath, written and directed by Francis Galluppi.
Nothing is known about the plots of either of these new additions to the franchise, although there are rumours that Bruce Campbell may return as the iconic Ashley J. 'Ash' Williams in Wrath.
Production has begun this week - in Auckland, New Zealand - on Evil Dead Wrath. The occasion was marked by the release of the movie's striking, retro logo (pictured above).
This weekend found Nick and I back at our local wargames' show, Cavalier, at the Angel Centre in Tonbridge.
It was my first time in a couple of years and while I wasn't feeling one hundred percent, I was determined that my excitement would see me through. And, thanks to Nick stepping in as my ad hoc 'carer' (in the absence of Rachel, who was at home with Alice), I managed an impressive (for me) three hours at the show.
The highlight of the day came early, when Nick and I had barely seen a quarter of the displays and traders, as a gentleman from the Maidstone Wargames Society invited us to join in their Labyrinths of Mars participation game.
This was one I'd mentally flagged ahead of time, looking at the list of games on the show's website, because - as I suspected - it was John Carter themed.
The game was a reskinning of the classic family board game Labyrinth, which I'd played with Nick and his son, Alec, several years ago. However, this iteration included fighting and treasure hunting, and was scaled up to feature 28mm miniatures.
My dynamic duo of Barsoomian warriors before battle commenced
The ever-moving Labyrinth of Mars
Nick's team (top) make a strategic withdrawal from my gang (bottom)
As with the boardgame, you always start your turn by sliding a spare tile into the layout - pushing all the other tiles in that row on one space, thus constantly reconfiguring the Martian (Barsoomian) maze, and making planning ahead quite challenging.
There were four of playing and we each had four objectives to find before we could escape the labyrinth, be they treasures, allies, or boosts, and you could earn special cards as well that gave you extra abilities or bonuses.
I'd got three of my objectives (a couple of artifacts and a Barsoomian prince), without making too much of a scene about it, but the last thing I needed for my 'collection' was The Great White Ape (pictured above).
The only problem was The Ape had just joined Nick's team, as Nick had played a "brain transfer" card on it, giving it a Barsoomian brain... rather than a raging great ape's brain!
So, I had to attack Nick's party! Aided by the prince, we overpowered Nick's characters (and with some lucky die rolls) and the ape opted to join my "stronger" team.
Then on my next turn (again more by luck than judgement), I was able to slide the walls of the maze to open a straight avenue to the exit... where I was declared not just the winner, but WARLORD OF MARS.
I suspect Nick is never going to forget how I robbed him of potential victory!
After this, we resumed our patrol of the main hall, and the first person we bumped into - who was demonstrating his grid-based Vietnam War game - was Paul of Pazoot, a wargaming YouTube channel I have recently discovered (thanks to his work with Big Lee of Miniature Adventures).
This was my first - in-person - encounter with an actual YouTuber.
Paul's 'Nam game, which he was putting on with the East Kent Wargames Society, will be the second of his Battle Chronicle range of narrow-focused rules sets across different historical periods. The first is 1812: Retreat from Moscow, which Big Lee is working on.
Here follows a brief selection of some of the other games being played at Cavalier:
Shepway Gamers' The Englishman's Castle: a 28mm Wars of the Roses conflict
Of course, as well as gaming, these events are also for shopping. Both Nick and I, in our own way, were surprisingly restrained this year. While Nick didn't buy anything, I managed to restrict myself to items for my Dead Man's Hand (Wild West) game.
I found myself mainly being drawn towards terrain, as I have enough unpainted gunfighters etc already, waiting to sent off for painting.
Amazing fantasy terrain at surprisingly affordable prices - I'm impressed I resisted
Pumpernickle Games do some lovely stuff - I hope to get some desert bits from them at a later date, but, in the meantime, who doesn't want their own Stonehenge?
At the end of the day, I only purchased a Western bank, from Beowulf, with interior fixtures and fittings; a pair of metal cacti and a pair of resin outhouses from Debris of War; and a log cabin.
My haul from Cavalier 2026
It was a great time and I'm glad I persevered. I'd wanted to play at least one participation game, but wasn't sure if I was up to it. So I'm delighted it happened to me one I was looking forward to checking out.
I did have one "funny turn" - after squatting down to look at some items that were being displayed on the floor, then bobbing up again. But Nick kindly offered me his arm and helped me to a chair, where I could rest a while.
Once I got home (Rachel came and picked me up), I was totally zonked out for the rest of the day, then had a rough night of near-continuous coughing. But, you know what, it was so worth it.
I had a fantastic time with one of my oldest friends, we got to play an awesome wargame... which I won, we chatted with a ton of people, and I got myself some more bits for my PROJECT 60 wargame of choice.
And I've already have made a shopping list of future bits and bobs I can order from these traders online.
Below, you will see a 17-minute video by Model Paint Whatever of the sights and sounds of the day, which shows off way more of the games on display than I have:
And here's a piece from Big Lee himself about Cavalier:
When Prince Caspianbreathed new life into The Chronicles Of Narnia franchise (after the pretty bland Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe), I had high expectations for the next adaptation from the cycle: The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader.
And I wasn't disappointed.
Lucy (Georgie Henley) and Edmund Pevensie (Skandar Keynes) find themselves transported once again from war-torn England to the fantastical land of Narnia.
This time the method of transport is a magical painting and they are joined by their obnoxious and cowardly cousin Eustice (the greatWill Poulter in an early role).
Plucked from the sea by King (formerly Prince) Caspian (Ben Barnes) on board the sailing ship Dawn Treader, the children soon find themselves swept up in an epic voyage to track the location of seven lost friends of Caspian's father who held seven magic swords that are required to defeat a growing evil in the East.
The evil manifests itself as a green mist that has the ability to project itself as one's fears and doubts.
There is a moment, towards the end, when Edmund realises that the green mist has latched onto his own fears and with the look he gives, and the way he says "oh no", you just know 90 per cent of the adults watching are thinking: "Stay Puft Marshmallow Man".
Voyage Of The Dawn Treader is a classic sea-borne, island-hopping tale, in the style of The Odyssey and Sinbad stories, with every island being a different - increasingly dark - encounter for our party of adventurers as they make their way towards their final destination.
A true family action adventure film, this expands the fantasy world of Narnia beautifully, with some truly amazing visuals - to rival those of Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings movies - and high quality special effects that are so slick they never threaten to shatter your suspension of disbelief.
Director Michael Apted ensures there's never a dull moment here and, even though our heroes never actually set foot on the final island, the story wraps up in a suitably magical and convincing fashion that shouldn't leave anyone dissatisfied.
Although there is physical conflict in Voyage Of The Dawn Treader, most of the story revolves around dealing with intellectual and emotional problems - but in ways far more exciting than I've just made it sound!
A clever story, unsurprisingly there are "messages" in the text, but they are reasonably subtle and good natured, working on a fairy tale moral level rather than a sledgehammer approach.
The returning young performers, Henley and Keynes, have grown into their roles.
For completists there are some nice cameos by Tilda Swinton as The White Witch, Anna Popplewell as Susan Pevensie and William Moseley as Peter Pevensie.
Liam Neeson once more lends his vocal skills to Aslan and geek-favourite Simon Pegg replaces Eddie Izzard as the voice of warrior mouse Reepicheep.
The source material's Christian allegory gets a bit heavy-handed at the end when Aslan is talking to Lucy about "being known by another name" in our world (I'm presuming it's not Leo), but given then one of the characters willingly volunteers to travel on to "Aslan's country" (Heaven?) is this also advocating suicide as the character wasn't dead, just satisfied that he had had enough adventures in Narnia?
And, of course, the big difference between believing in Aslan, in Narnia, and believing in God, in the real world, is that Aslan is a walking, talking, breathing lion - not so much a test of faith as a test of eyesight.
Sometimes, I guess, it doesn't pay to think too much about these things!
It's a year after the events in The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe and the four Pevensies are summoned back to the magical kingdom of Narnia from wartime London for further adventures in Prince Caspian.
While it may only be 12 months since they left, hundreds of years have passed in Narnia and a human kingdom, Telmarine, has risen to prominence and driven the supernatural natives to near extinction.
The "old kings and queens of Narnia" were summoned by Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes), rightful heir to Telmarine, who is escaping his usurping uncle's assassins.
Peter (William Moseley), Edmund (Skandar Keynes), Lucy (Georgie Henley) and Susan (Anna Popplewell) join with Caspian to bring the Narnians out of hiding and restore peace and harmony to the land.
From the outset this is darker film than its predecessor and more violent, as its central focus is the war between Narnia and the colonising Telmarines.
Although the running time is nearly two-and-three-quarter hours, the story races along with superb pacing and almost non-stop action scenes, with each battle or duel somehow managing to top the one that came before.
As with the first Chronicles of Narnia film, the weakest element of this generally superb film is the younger leading actors - all of whom (with the exception of Edmund, who has a hint of the 'dark side' about him after he was tempted by the White Witch) have yet to develop the chops to make their characters' feel more rounded - and only really shine in the fight sequences.
Thankfully there are enough supporting characters - many of whom brought to life by incredible CGI - who are more than capable of carrying the film (particular praise has to go to the mouse Reepicheep, who I only realised towards the end was voiced by Eddie Izzard).
As fantasy war films go, Prince Caspian is an amazing display of unearthly fighting (just look for the Telmarine's adopting a Testudo formation and the centaur jumping into the middle of them) that should entertain its target audience and provide great inspiration to role-players looking to add a splash of colour to their combat sequences.
All the crowdfunded shiny goodness of Twilight Sword is on track to be shipped to backers around the beginning of August, however the PDFs of the two main books and starter set could be sent out as early as the end of March.
These nuggets dropped during the first livestream of the year, yesterday, by two of the founders of the game's Italian production company, Two Little Mice, Riccardo “Rico” Sirignano and Simone Formicola.
The game, the company's biggest project to date, is currently going through extensive playtesting to hone the mechanics.
While the land of Radia remains central to the default campaign included in Twilight Sword, the core book has been rewritten to make the game more setting agnostic, so gamemasters can easily use their own settings with the system.
The bulk of the livestream concerned the production of other current Two Little Mice projects, such as Outgunned Superheroes, the latest variant of their action movie-styled roleplaying game.
Without going into too much detail, it was revealed that the company's next crowdfunding campaign, taking place in May, would be another addition to Outgunned.
Let's get one thing straight - this is not the next Lord Of The Rings. That trilogy set the bar so high for fantasy films that it would take something pretty amazing to even equal it. The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is not that film.
Amazing (but sometimes a bit wonky) effects sequences, wonderfully animated talking creatures, beautiful sweeping New Zealand scenery and odd flashes of humour can't stop this being very clearly an old school children's' film with a simplistic story, cheesy - yet key, from the source material - bits (like the appearance of Father Christmas to hand out the 'magic weapons') and occasional two-dimensional characters.
While we're obviously supposed to root for our young protagonists - the Pevensie siblings: Georgie Henley as Lucy; Skandar Keynes as Edmund; William Moseley as Peter; and Anna Popplewell as Susan - they are rather overwhelmed by the supernatural elements of the story, particularly the pitch perfect casting of the iconic Tilda Swinton as Jadis The White Witch.
Thankfully the Christian subtext of C.S. Lewis's novel is presented here subtly and Liam Neeson turns in a warm vocal performance as Aslan, but it's the CGI Beavers and wolves that will really stick in the mind.
A mild distraction, The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is a pleasant piece of gore-free fluff that would have become (in the olden days of limited TV channels) a Saturday afternoon television staple to distract the wee kiddies from their consoles and social media once ITV's copy of the Railway Children had worn out.
Hi. This vid product examines two very early, transformative stories in the Judge Dredd canon. It’s time to travel to the future setting of Mega-City One and have some fun poking tyranny in its stupid eye.
Conan the Barbarian will team-up with Italian comic book icon Dragonero this May in a seven-part miniseries published for the first time outside of Italy by Titan Comics and Conan rights' holders Heroic Signature.
In Conan & Dragonero, the legendary barbarian finds himself transported to a mysterious land called Erondár, the home of dragon-slaying hero Dragonero.
After the traditional initial misunderstanding triggered by such meetings, the two heroes realise they must team-up to fight the mysterious forces that threaten both their worlds.
This series is written by Dragonero's creators Luca Enoch and Stefano Vietti, with art from Lorenzo Nuti.
Now, it has finally made its way into the American comic book format:
TWO WORLDS COLLIDE IN A SAVAGE CROSSOVER YEARS IN THE MAKING!
CONAN OF CIMMERIA and DRAGONERO meet for the first time in an epic clash of steel, sorcery, and survival. Pulled to the mysterious land of Erondár by dark forces, Conan comes face to face with the famed dragon slayer, Dragonero, and the two warriors must set aside suspicion to stand back-to-back against a supernatural force poised to doom both their worlds.
Published for the first time outside of Italy, this landmark crossover brings together two legendary heroes in a story that honors classic sword-and-sorcery while forging something bold and unforgettable.
My pop culture Odyssey: a slice of super-powered geek life with heavy emphasis on pulp adventure, horror, comic books, westerns, superheroes, sci-fi, giant monsters, zombies etc
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
