The following post contains SPOILERS FOR AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR. If you do not wish for that movie to be spoiled, please do not read that section (or don’t read this post at all). The rest of this post contains no spoilers but I could not help myself with that one. Read at your own risk.
Now that that’s out of the way, Happy Friday, Friends! If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you know I’ve loved doing my monthly book review posts. And if you read my blog last month, you know that I have decided to switch things up and include things I’ve been watching and listening to in my review posts as well! So here is my second ever “Reading, Watching, Listening” post. I hope you enjoy reading these reviews as much I as I enjoy writing them!
Table of Contents
Books:
The Casual Vacancy by JK Rowling
Well, it turns out I didn’t really enjoy it. I think JK Rowling is an excellent writer. But I think she can be too blunt and crude for my tastes. Hence why I enjoyed her “children’s” novels and not her adult novels. The Casual Vacancy follows the goings on of a small town after a key member of the parish council dies unexpectedly. It’s very political. But surprisingly, I didn’t mind that. In fact, I was drawn in by the small town politics and frankly, the pettiness of a lot of the characters.
But it was difficult to get into. I found myself avoiding reading it whenever I had time. That is, until about two-thirds of the way through the book. I think part of that was because there were so many characters and the book jumped around to each of their perspectives so it took a while to start to understand and care for them.
I will say the ending was unexpected and sort of jarring. It certainly challenged my perspective on some things and I think some people would certainly benefit from reading it. But I can’t really say I give my stamp of approval because of the crude nature of some of the content. So read at your own risk.
Blog Posts/Articles:
- EVERYTHING going on over on A Prioritized Marriage this month. May is Date Your Mate month and Amberly is stepping it up with…
- blog posts
- Guidelines We’ve Set to Make Our Date Nights Count
- Our Favorite Date Night Resources
- Six Apps Every Couple Should have on their Phone
- And MANY more!
- Instagram content
- Her brand new Facebook group!
- 10 Tips for Fostering Better Communication in Marriage from Young Wives Club
- The Difference Between Empathy and Sympathy from The New Wifestyle
- 5 Self-Care Tips if You’re Highly Empathetic from The New Wifestyle
TV Shows:
Better Call Saul
Anne with an E
Movies:
A Quiet Place
You guys, A Quiet Place was SO GOOD! So as I’m sure you know from the trailers, this family has to be really quiet because the monsters that have taken over the world are attracted to sound. As long as they can be quiet, they’re safe. So the movie used sound as a huge character involved in the story telling. And it used a lot if indirect story telling in general. You had to infer the backstory from clues you see (or hear) here and there. I thought they did a fantastic job with this. I don’t want to give too much away but the sound mixing was really cool.
The whole concept of a movie where the characters hardly ever talk is so foreign to us. It was weird sitting in an almost silent theater when I’m so used to high action, super hero movies that almost burst our ear drums! But that’s what made it so great. This movie is certainly a piece of art and I hope it wins a lot of awards.
Oh and it is very suspenseful. I doubt that’s a surprise. But there are almost no jump scares. As far as the scariest parts, they are sort of expected. Does that make sense? Basically I’m trying to say it’s not that scary of a movie.
The Ritual
All the Marvel Cinematic Universe Movies [Possible SPOILERS if you haven’t seen these]
In the two weeks leading up to the Avengers: Infinity War premier, Pearson and I watched all the MCU movies out so far. Actually, that’s not entirely true. We didn’t watch The Incredible Hulk because it’s not Mark Ruffalo. But, it apparently does count in the univeres so I wish we did watch it. We also didn’t watch Black Panther again because we didn’t have movie pass yet and didn’t want to spend the money to see it in the theater again. But we watched all 16 of the others!
I forgot how good the Iron Man movies were! I don’t love Robert Downey Jr nor do I love Tony Stark. At least not as much as others in the series. But the Iron Man movies are actually pretty good! I mean, it makes sense, right? They’re the movies that started this whole phenomenon. Oh and in Pearson’s words, “The Iron Man movies are the most realistic Marvel movies as far as science and technology are concerned.” So that’s why he likes them so much. haha
I will say though that Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World are probably my two least favorite in the whole MCU. But they’re still pretty great! It’s just unfortunate that they come back to back. But, as I said, all of these movies are all really good.
And I am so glad we watched them all together because certain things made more sense and I picked up on things better. For example, in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, when SHIELD falls to Hydra, there is a particular SHIELD agent (Specialist Klein) who shows up later in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Oh and Marie Hill is shown interviewing for a job with Stark after SHIELD falls and the next time we see her she’s working for Stark. I wouldn’t have put those things together if I didn’t watch them back to back.
Also, did you know Cap says “I can do this all day.” In ALL of his movies? And lastly, both Bucky and Loki’s stories are so much more raw and emotional when you watch the movies back to back. You can see them turning from friend or brother to villain and back and it just means so much more!
So I think when Avengers 4 comes out, we might start even earlier and watch them all again but include the TV show Agents of SHIELD too. Maybe we’re crazy. Who knows.
Infinity War. [SPOILERS]
Okay first of all ALL THE WRONG PEOPLE DIED. Which just means they will all be coming back somehow. And I kind of hate that. Alright let me take a step back. I expected this movie to be devastating because they were facing Thanos, the most powerful being in the universe. And because there is a part two coming out next year. So I figured Thanos was going to dominate during this movie and the Avengers would rally again next year.
What I didn’t expect was to be left with all the original Avengers and have all the new kids on the block disappear rapture style at the end. I mean Evans, RDJ, and Hemsworth’s contracts are almost up (except Hemsworth might be extending his but that’s another story for another time). And there’s no way Marvel isn’t going to make more Black Panther and Spider-Man movies. So, I totally give them props for going for the unexpected. They definitely took me off guard. But at the same time, I wasn’t really even that sad when everybody died because they will be coming back. I mean after all, as Dr. Strange said “It was the only way.” So something crazy is going to happen to make everything right again.
I will say that I’m pretty confident that only the people who disappeared at the end will come back. Which means that everyone who died before that are really gone. Which makes me super sad for Loki! I wasn’t sad when it happened because I was like “everybody is going to die so w/e.” But now I’m sad because he’s probably really gone for good.
Anyway, I could talk theories all day. But I’ll just say everybody needs to go see it. And I also highly recommend taking a month or so to watch all the movies back to back. It’s pretty great!
Update 5/18: I wrote the above “review” right after I saw the movie. Now it’s been four weeks and I am not so sure the people who died before the finger snap are dead for good. After all, Loki is an ice giant. If he really died, wouldn’t he turn blue and die as his true form? Also he told Thor that the sun will shine on their people again. Also, the next Guardians is supposed to focus on Gamora. Now it could be on a different timeline or maybe Gamora comes back but she’s not really back (there are lots of theories). Anyway I said I wasn’t going to get into too many theories but I just wanted to correct my opinion.
P.S. Sorry this wasn’t exactly a “review.” I feel like at this point, a review of an MCU movie won’t persuade you to watch it or not. They have a cult following and you either love them or not. This movie was the best MCU movie so far in my opinion for many reasons. They had a lot of hype to live up to. They had a BIG and seriously dangerous villain to portray. And they had 40+ named characters all fighting for screen time. I thought they did an excellent job. When the movie was over, I didn’t even realize it had been two and a half hours. I thought we still had half the movie. And that’s saying something! Especially since it started at 11 pm.
Ok I’m done now, I promise.
YouTube:
SNL
Avengers Stuff
My favorite channel that I’ve found for the latter is New Rockstars. These guys are comic book nerds but they have great presentation and I’ve watched all the videos they’ve made since the movie came out (which is a lot).
Listening:
NEXT:
- Book: I’m not sure. I bought some Mary Higgins Clark books from the friends of the library sale recently. I’m also thinking about reading the Harry Potter series again this summer to get ready for Wizards Unite. And as I mentioned earlier in this post, I kinda wanna read Anne of Green Gables. Oh and per Ali of Our Happily Ever After’s recommendation, I kinda wanna read Jane Eyre too. Too much to read and too little time!
- Movies: Deadpool 2 and Solo: A Star Wars Story, of course. But we have Movie Pass now so we’ll probably be seeing a lot more than that.
- TV: Pearson and I are currently watching The Walking Dead and I am currently watching A Little Help with Carol Burnett.
What have you been reading, watching, and listening to lately? Have any recommendations for me? Let me know in the comments!
Thanks for reading!
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