James Adams' Writing Blog

Aliens: Defiance #1 Review – Enter Zula Hendricks: An Average Start

This review is also published on Comicvine. Cover by Massimo Carnevale Aliens: Defiance is a 12 issue run that was originally published by Dark Horse Comics between April 2016 and June 2017. Written by Brian Wood, art by Tristan Jones and coloured by Dan Jackson. And who can forget the wonderful first cover created by Massimo Carnevale. I’ll start off by saying that I’ve been a massive fan of the…

Aliens: Defiance #2 Review – The Dark and Brutal Reality of Space Travel

I’ll start by saying I retract my initial statement made about Tristan Jones’ art that I made in my review of the first issue, in fact. I never actually noticed how detailed the environments were, let alone the outfits that the characters wore in this issue and the previous. Anyway, onto this issue’s review. I’ll start off by saying that I underestimated how interesting a character Zula would be…

Aliens: Defiance #3 Review – Alone and Scared

At only three issue’s in, we have an artist change. And not one for the better. Taking over from Tristan Jones we have Riccardo Burchielli, who’s art while nicely shaded. Isn’t very impressive. While Riccardo’s art pales in detail compared to Tristan. One thing he does get right is making the characters feel alone. Taking advantage of the emptiness of the Europa, Zula & Davis’ ship. A unique…

Aliens: Defiance #4 Review – Memories

This issue features the wonderful art of Tony Brescini, who takes over from Riccardo Burchielli the previous issue. As we follow Zula and Davis’ journey through space, we take some time out to discover why Zula is who she is and how she got her injury. While intriguing to discover, feels pointless as it was obvious to what It may have been since they first starting teasing the readers as to what…

The Thanos Problem: Was he right?

Since the release of Avengers: Infinity War on April 26th, I’ve been pondering if Thanos’ actions were right or wrong and if the Avengers should have tried to stop him. I saw Infinity War on its release day with one of my close friends, both of us pumped to see the film after waiting for it for so many years. The build-up was worth it. My friend and I came out of the film happy and baffled by…

Dead Frontier 2: An Early Access Review

What Did I Just Watch? – Jingai-San no Yome

First posted on https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/cloudguy/blog/review-jingai-san-no-yome-what-did-i-just-watch/137055/ I’ve been trying to work out the best way to describe this show in a single sentence since I first watched the show a little while back and I think I finally found it. “Jingai-San no Yome is a light-hearted surreal comedy that really doesn’t go anywhere but in…

Avengers: Endgame Review – The End of an Era (Spoiler-Filled)

First posted on https://comicvine.gamespot.com/profile/cloudguy/blog/avengers-endgame-review-the-end-of-an-era-spoiler-/137252/ I’ve spent a while now staring at a blank page wondering how to start this review, because I feel that it will become an outlier in the grand scheme of reviews Avengers: Endgame will get. First, I need to clarify something before people grab their pitchforks and torches…

How I would fix Avengers: Endgames’ Act 1 (Spoilers)

As some of you may know, I wasn’t exactly the biggest fan of 2019’s Avengers: Endgame. In fact, I thought it was a pretty rough movie that could be improved on exponentially. If you’d like to read my review of the film click here. The biggest downfall of Endgame for me was the poorly paced and tonally awkward opening act, with jokes every other line and scenes dragging on longer than they should…

Power Rangers (2017) Review

I know, I know – this isn’t exactly the article that I said was next, but I figured that since I’m watching this film I may as well review it. I remember seeing this in the cinema back when it came out and honestly, I couldn’t remember much of it until I re-watched it. That’s not a bad thing, right? Right? It only came out in 2017 (honestly thought it was 2014) so it wasn’t that long…

Detective Pikachu (2019) – Mini Review

With Detective Pikachu finally released worldwide, fans have been flocking to see the first official live action Pokémon film. But the question is, how good is it?Detective Pikachu follows the journey of Tim (Justice Smith), a Pokémonless human who travels to Ryme city after his father passes away. After stumbling upon a conspiracy, he reluctantly teams up with Detective Pikachu (Ryan Reynolds)…

Fun Home – A Tony Award Winning Comic Book Musical

I’m a massive fan of musicals and comics, but the idea of both is something that never occurred to me until I came across “Fun Home”. What is Fun Home? Fun Home follows the life of Alison Bechdel from childhood to adulthood. A story about acceptance, sexuality, coming of age, and what lies can do to a family.Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic was released in 2006 in the form of an Original Graphic…

An Interview with a Viner: Waezi2

I’d like to start off by saying that I’m a wiki-editor known as Cloudguy over at the site Comicvine and I have been for quite a while, managing to get into the top 3 contributors. After weeks of thinking of something to do instead of wiki work, “An Interview with a Viner” was born!Welcome to the first edition of the new “Interview with a Viner” series in which I interview popular or influential…

The other day I came across a twitter post asking what were the first 5 video games that you remember playing? Tekken 3 Spyro: Enter the Dragon Rugrats: Search for Reptar Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped Power Rangers: Lightspeed Rescue (I completely forgot that game exiwted up until now) — James Adams (@JamesAdams221) May 14, 2019 And it made me realise that two out of the five, I haven’t thought…

Justice League: Odyssey #1 Review

Following the events of Justice League: No Justice, the rag-tag group of Azrael, Cyborg, Jessica Cruz and Starfire head into what is known as the Ghost Sector to discover what lies within. Cover by Stjepan Šejić Official issue text: Spinning out of JUSTICE LEAGUE: NO JUSTICE! When a cosmic menace threatens worlds beyond our own in the Ghost Sector, it falls to a new Justice League team to answer…

Justice League: Odyessy #2 Review

Stjepan Šejić’s Fantastic Foil Cover After the revelation that is was Darkseid who summoned Azrael, Cyborg and Starfire to the Ghost Sector last issue, there’s no surprise that they aren’t too pleased about it! Once again this issue features the wonderful art of Stjepan Šejić and story by Joshua Williamson. With part 2 of the Ghost Sector story arc underway, the heroes realise that they must act…

Justice League: Odyssey #3 Review

Cover by Stjepan Šejić Philippe Briones and Jeromy Cox take over from Stjepan Šejić as artist and colourist this issue. I’m going to be honest here, I have nothing against Briones’ art, but, it’s jarring to go from Šejić’s art to Briones. The latter is a fantastic artist but it seems that he has an issue with drawing faces as several faces come across as unnatural or stretched. While Briones may…