A “Castlevania” television show was never supposed to work. The legendary video game series achieved its reputation not through its stories, but through an incredible mix of stylistic, musical and gameplay prowess. To take this kind of setup and create a television show around it ...
There are certain expectations that come from Thor Odinson as a Marvel Comics character. The hammer. The boasting. The grand scale of his adventures. Over 60 years, numerous writers have developed the once proud prince and now righteous Avenger into one of the core characters of Marvel Comics. Al Ewing’s “The Immortal Thor Vol. 1” (2023) embraces these roots, but also expands on them, resulting in an incredibly engaging and spellbinding first issue.
Does the president of Tufts really live at the president's residence? Are there koi fish in the Gifford House garage? Will squirrely eat his nut? The Daily discovers answers to these questions and more on a tour of Gifford House with outgoing University President Anthony Monaco.
It takes very little to make a member of the BEATs team laugh — about as much as it takes to get them to start hitting a paint bucket.
If one were to stand next to the Somerville Theater on the night of Feb. 15, they would probably think the building was closed. No lights, no sounds and only the cold air blowing in their faces to provide any semblance of movement in the area. Yet just one door over in the theater’s own recently revamped Crystal Ballroom, the sci-fi community of the greater Boston area was throwing the party of the year. The chandelier-clad room was bathed in blue light and as a remote-controlled Mouse Droid prop rolled around the replica TARDIS in the center of the room, a dozen people lined up in a variety of “Doctor Who” (1963–) related outfits for a costume contest. This was how the Boston Sci-Fi Film Festival, the second oldest independent genre film festival in the country, officially opened its 48th year.
It feels unfair to mention “Rocky” (1976) when discussing “Creed III” (2023). As the first film in the boxing franchise without the Italian Stallion in any capacity (minus a producing credit), it’s clear from the get-go that this is the beginning of the post-”Rocky” era for the, until now, aptly named “Rocky” series. It was an inevitable transition, and who better to lead it than Adonis Creed (Michael B. Jordan) himself behind the director’s chair? Yet, for a film that is so clearly trying to move in its own path, it cannot help but continue to dwell in the past. “Creed III” feels like an unmade sequel to the first “Creed” (2015) — what “Creed II” (2018) would have been without Stallone or Russians — and except for an incredible performance from Jonathan Majors as the film’s antagonist, it falls just short of its predecessors.
It doesn’t always feel good to come full circle. Without enough change or perspective, it can feel like what it literally is: going in a loop. It feels almost worse to see such a lap happen to others, and both in and out of the show itself, that is the case with season 2 of Amazon Prime Video and Critical Role’s “The Legend of Vox Machina” (2022–). Characters return to their roots, check up on estranged family and interrogate what they want out of their own lives. Yet by the time the season ends, it feels like so much of what made the first season a pleasant but overreaching animated fantasy show has remained intact for better and worse. Season 2 is a better, more fleshed out show than what came before it, but its retention of the series’ key flaws makes it a more frustrating experience than ever.
If “The Menu” (2022) taught us anything, it's that food is an art. From Davis Square to Cambridge and even into Boston, the Tufts area has some incredible food offerings. Here are some of our Arts writers’ favorite spots.
Siavash Raissi’s top 10 movies of 2022:
The final season of “Game of Thrones” (2011-19) was not bad. For all its fumbling and all its bluntness, the way the world last left Westeros was emblematic of the environment that the show and books that inspired it created. In the show’s aftermath, the prequel show “House of the Dragon” (2022) was released in August of this year. Though the prequel seemingly tried to become “the next” “Game of Thrones” or “fix” what the original had wrong at its core, this isn’t the case. Because not only is “House of the Dragon” good, but also it has also effectively resurrected its predecessor’s cultural relevance in an expert display of craft, acting and writing.
