April has always felt a bit like a filler month to me. I don’t know if it’s helped much by the fact that it’s still cold all the time and that Tears of the Kingdom is out in a few weeks, but I’ve spent most of my time willing this month to be over. As it draws to a close, here are some of the things that have helped keep the black dog at bay.
Games
LEGO City Undercover
Traveller’s Tales are the most ‘we only do one thing’ studio still around, to such a degree that they make Ubisoft seem delightfully experimental by comparison. I like a LEGO game from time to time. There’s something undeniably satisfying about beating the everloving shit out of everything around you for an endless stream of studs to hoover up. It’s jangling keys to the max, but if the mood is right it hits just the right spot. This license-free send up of open world games was a lot of fun, and despite not being able to evoke Batman or Star Wars or whatever other stale IP the studio get their grubby mitts on, it ended up having a lot of character. I liked it a lot, and the final mission really goes in some wild places. Worth a shot, albeit with the caveat that it doesn’t run particularly well on Switch, where I played it.
Steamworld Dig 2
I have a great deal of respect for the Steamworld games. They do a lot with what seems like relatively little, and a lot of what makes them so compelling to play is that they’re just really polished versions of established genre tropes. Dig 2 is a great sequel, a mix of mining, platforming and puzzle solving that makes what is actually a relatively subdued gameworld feel absolutely massive. I don’t believe that Image and Form Games have ever made a duff entry, and even though I don’t really like city builders, i’m willing to give their next game a go purely on this pedigree alone.
Ghostwire Tokyo
I was really worried that this open world horror experience from the creators of the Evil Within was going to suffer badly for being ‘one of those games’. I can’t deny that it definitely makes my eyes glaze over a little bit whenever I open the map screen and a dozen icons suddenly pop up. But what’s impressive about Tango Gameworks’ sprawling spectre ridden metropolis is how little it feels like a genre staple. What helps is that the streets of Tokyo have never looked better: winding alleyways, towering office blocks, streets littered with the remnants of the population who but a moment ago were just there. It’s a really lavish, creepy environment to explore and although the combat is doing absolutely nothing for me, I’m keen to keep playing just to soak in the atmosphere alone.
Films
Palm Springs
Time loop stories are inherently a bit fucky if you spend too much time thinking about them, but surprisingly few films actually do this. There’s a great Jacob Geller video essay entitled Time Loop Nihilism that looks at how media and literature examines the grotesque pressure that bears down on the human soul when they know that nothing they do matters. In this regard, and in spite of it’s comedic visage I would strongly consider Palm Springs to be an existential horror film. Leads Andy Samberg and Christin Milioti spend a great deal of the film’s tight 90 runtime examining the fact that even though all their actions are undone the moment they either die or fall asleep, because they remember everything the weight of the expectation to be good remains on their shoulders. This is a brilliant film, I cannot reccomend it enough.
The Place Beyond the Pines
Those of you who follow me on Twitter will know how sad I am that Ryan Gosling seems forever trapped in serious roles, because at heart he’s a brilliantly funny man. He absolutely stole the show in The Nice Guys, I have every faith that the Barbie Movie will excell for him being in it, and I hope one day the folk in the right positions start to appreciate what a loss it is every time he gets lumped into some mournful drama or thriller where he has basically fuck all to work with. Having said that, The Place Beyond the Pines is a really nice surprise. An expanding dramatic thriller about a man doing bad to do good, and how the consequences of his actions end up reaching out across generations. A nice earlier performance from OA star Emory Cohen too, I did the Leo Dicaprio point when he first showed up. ‘that’s Homer!’ I yelled, to noone in particular. Good film.
Mobile Suit Gundam I
I’m not really quite sure what to say about this classic. I’m not a Gundam guy. I don’t know where it fits into the grand topography of this vast big fighting robots franchise. It was nice to watch such an old animation, there’s a chunky physicality to the way characters move on the screen. At times you can see the individual animation cells and there is a certain sort of charm to that in the wake of the smoothness and polish of modern animation. Storywise it’s a little jumbled, but very compelling. You can tell it’s a compilation of a series, there’s not really a natural conclusion, it just keeps going for a while, but the themes and stakes of this tale of war are well realized. I also now completely understand the fandoms love of gay nuisance Char Aznable, a really compelling antagonist who wouldn’t look out of place on Harvey Birdman. Really enjoyed experiencing a piece of history here.
Music
Playing the Piano - Ryuichi Sakamoto
Listen I’m not going to fuck about and tell you how much Ryuichi Sakamoto meant to me, because my relationship with his music was ancillary at best. But credit where credits due he was an incredibly talented musician and those of us previously unfamiliar have 40 years worth of music to look back on and enjoy. This is a really lovely album of piano pieces, and as someone in the process of learning the instrument, it’s been great hearing tunes that are sophisticated and beautiful but eminently achievable even for a novice like me. My goal for the rest of the year is to learn some of these pieces.
Desire, I want to turn into you - Caroline Polachek
Powerful, powerful 90s nostalgia pouring out of every nook and cranny of this brilliant pop album, and its not just because she has Dido feature on one of the tracks. You would never guess it’s a brand new 2023 offering given how otherworldly it’s approach to genre is. Polachek has a great voice and a wonderful collection of ear worms, it’s hit me in the place where St Vincent’s music never quite reached. A new addition to the collection of wicked tunes from wicked gals. A wonderful surprise.
72 Seasons - Metallica
I’m not really a Metal fan. I like Ghost. That’s about it. I know 72 Seasons has not been particularly well recieved by fans, but I’ve found myself listening to this multiple times over the past few weeks. It’s such a dumb collection of songs, almost a parody of the beer swilling, sweaty long haired metalhead with the two foot neck and an obsession with double bass pedalling. An album for folk who like Ride the Lightning and nothing else. And yet still, I found a lot of joy in listening to it. James Hetfield still has a brilliant voice. Lars Ulrich is still a terrible percussionist. Take what you will from this.
Books
Chainsaw Man - Tatsuji Fujimoto
Gutted to have to admit that now i’ve started reading it, Chainsaw Man is really bloody good. A goofy, nihilistic shonen manga story about an incredibly down on his luck monster hunter who in an act of desperation makes a pact with a demon that transforms him into something truly frightening. Denji being a young, stupid and incredibly horny teen is not taken for granted here, in fact it’s an essential part of the narrative, exploring his innate vulnerability to the pressures of hidden actors in this incredibly horrible reality, but also allowing for a great amount of levity to cut through the tension. A really fun manga.
Battle Tendency - Hirohiko Araki
One of the more problematic parts of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure on account of the whole ‘hey this Nazi commander is pretty rad actually’, in spite of this I do have a soft spot for Battle Tendency, marking the last point before Araki went all in on the brilliantly inventive Stand nonsense that would permeate the series going forward. The Pillar Men being such a straightforward group of antagonists means that a lot of the drama has to come from characterisation as much as it does from creative combat ideas. It helps that Joseph Jostar is a really fun protagonist, a real jackass and a product of his time whose flaws would go on to be explored later in the series.
And that’s April! As I sign off on the last day of the month I hope you are all well and finding small joys in the world wherever they may hide. A new Zelda AND a new Arkane game next month! I’ve also got three fairly hefty video projects on the go that i’m hope to get at least two of out next month, but we’ll see what the devil brings us.
Take care!
You had me at "90s nostalgia"