One Last Adventure: The Making of Stranger Things 5 (2026)

A fly on the wall documentary highlighting the production of the final season of Stranger Things, which encompasses 10 years of development building up to its culmination. Combining 1980s nostalgia with the coming of age genre and Stephen King-style of horror, it became a global phenomenon to a whole new generation of kids, in the tradition of E.T., The Goonies and Stand by Me. As a fan of the show, I found it a cathartic look at saying goodbye to childhood.

3 emotional table reads out of 5

Note: There are Ups and Downs, but I'd rate the show 4 Demogorgons out of 5. 

Witchboard (2024)

Ah shit, here we go again. Another remake that completely loses its original appeal. In actuality, it bears little resemblance to the 1986 film, including the inane decision to replace the Ouija board with an ancient pendulum board that looks more like a dartboard. Except this one misses the mark completely. Regardless of superficial plot changes, I was utterly bored throughout.

1 cat thief out of 5

THE MORTAL INSTRUMENTS: CITY OF BONES [2013]

Director Harald Zwart adapts City Of Bones for the screen, the first book in Cassandra Clare's youth oriented fantasy novels series, The Mortal Instruments.
It's a messy execution that is cluttered up with too much dead end background lore and a collection of way too many characters that serve next to nothing to the story.  As opposed to the overly mopy Twilight series, TMI tries to add in some cheeky one-liners to lighten the mood and although some of them are pretty funny they are in all the wrong spots.  There's simply just too much pointlessly tossed in to the simple story that is pretty much just an excuse to dress up pretty young people in skimpy Goth clothing.

2 tarot cards out of 5

Anonymous (2011)

What a piece of garbage. The trailer had me hyped because I thought it was going to be some sort of mystery-of-the-ages thing like with The Da Vinci Code, but it was just a load of fabricated nonsense. Yes, its plot is entirely plausible, but that doesn't make it any less snoozeworthy. Maybe I just don't like "historical" dramas. One long, boring piece of quasi-entertainment that I do not soon plan to revisit.

1 nom de plume out of 5