No-Spoiler Review: Love, Death & Robots (Netflix)

It’s been a hot minute since I actually watched this one, but in the spirit of catching up on all the reviews I’ve fallen behind on, let’s do this! Before we get too far into this review, let me just start by saying this collection of (mostly) animated shorts is fully loaded with nudity (both male and female), loads of violence, blood and gore, profanity, horrific monsters and aliens, and sexually explicit content pretty much the whole way through. We’re talking lots of boobies and floppy wieners, guys, so if that bothers you, I’d keep on scrolling through your Netflix options. 😉

To give you an idea of what you’re in store for with Love, Death & Robots, I’ll give you a fun fact about the series. It was originally intended to be a theatrical rehaul of Heavy Metal. For whatever reason, this did not come to fruition so instead we wound up with 18 original shorts with unique animation styles and stories, most of which I really enjoyed. 🙂 Much like Heavy Metal, the stories often run in the genres of science fiction, horror and comedy. The animation is fantastic, with some of it being a more simplistic 2D style and some of it being so convincing it might take a couple minutes of watching it to realize it isn’t live action. Some of the shorts feel complete and others leave you wanting more because the possibilities it leaves you with are so endless.

A humorous trio of robot tourists exploring the ruins of a post-apocalyptic city, werewolf soldiers and other shapeshifters galore, farmers with mech suits who gotta protect themselves and their cows from insect-like aliens, and a haunted desert where the ghosts aren’t your typical human spirits make up only a sampling of what you have to look forward to with this collection of tales. Some were definitely better than others, but overall I enjoyed watching most of them. Plus, if you’re not digging one, fret not because they’re all pretty short. 😉 This is absolutely not for kids, and honestly probably not even for some adults. (Trigger Warnings galore for this anthology, just sayin’.)

If you’re a fan of exploring different animation styles and entertainment in the vein of Heavy Metal, it’s definitely worth binging your way through the anthology. Science Fiction and Horror with a dash of Comedy are the dominating genres in this series. I enjoyed most of the animated tales myself, but I could certainly see it not being everyone’s cup of tea. Most of them all brought something cool and interesting to the table, be it the animation style, plot, or characters, but I gotta give a special shout-out to my favorite (and also my LEAST favorite) stories.

My pick for the top 3 stories I enjoyed (in no particular order) would have to be:

1. Sonnie’s Edge
2. Three Robots
3. Shape-Shifters

And my pick for my LEAST favorite 3 of the series, also in no particular order are:

1. Alternate Histories
2. Ice Age
3. When the Yogurt Took Over

What about you guys? Anyone give this one a watch? What did you think? 🙂

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Saga, Vol. 9 (No-Spoilers) Review

Without hinting too much at what goes down in this volume, let me just say it is one you will immediately want to follow up with the next installment upon finishing. Unfortunately, Saga is on a lengthy hiatus for the time being, so be prepared for quite the cliff hanger AND quite the wait.

This was another solid volume to the series, but daaaaaamn. SO. MANY. FEELINGS.

I swear, if Saga isn’t busy wowing you with its great story-telling, compelling characters, and unique worldbuilding, its preoccupying itself by ripping your heart out and eating it raw. Saga continues to expertly pull the reader up with its highs and plummet them to the hard, cold ground with its crushing lows, and that’s one of the things that makes me love it so. You can never tell what is going to happen, and because of that you are reminded time and time again of the harshness that comes with real life. I think it makes me that much more invested in the characters of this series. Nine volumes deep, and Saga continues to keep readers on their toes and surprise them.

With certain scenes causing many of us to no doubt scream at the sky “Say it isn’t soooo!” or drop to their knees while crying, “NOOOOOOO!” all dramatically and what not, this hiatus is going to be like torture. Please see the below image, to see my mental image of Brian K. Vaughan vs. his readers at this point. I think it should be fairly obvious who is who. 😉

As if there was any doubt, this is another 5/5 star installment from me for Saga.

Words to Remember

“Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the Universe exist. Be curious. And however difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at. It matters that you don’t just give up.”     — Stephen Hawking

 

Saga, Volume 2: No Spoiler Review

Volume 1 of Saga had me madly in love at first read, and Volume 2 made me put a ring on it. This series really is something special. The writing. The artwork. The characters. It’s the total package.

It’s actually been a couple weeks since I finished reading this, but I kept getting sidetracked when it came to writing up a review for it. I think I’m going to have to attribute some of that to the fact that this is a tough series to review and define. It’s such a fresh, exciting, witty, and outrageous series that it can be hard trying to confine all of its awesomeness into a neat and tidy little package of a review. That, and sometimes I can be a total procrastinator. 😉

This volume gives all us Marko/Alana fans some much desired backstory of how they came to be the epic couple we now know and love.

We get to see Marko way back when he was just a little tyke and get some more insight regarding the friction between his and Alana’s people. We also get to learn more about how much of a book nerd Alana was before she was too busy on the run from bounty hunters to crack open a good book. (As if we needed any more reasons to love this woman!) ❤

And of course we have adventures aplenty from bounty hunting duo, The Will and Lying Cat, as well as a certain somebody from Marko’s past. Perhaps someone with an old grudge of her own?

Prince Robot IV is of course still relentless in his hunt of Alana and Marko. The man is willing to do anything to find them, even reading trashy romance novels.

Plus, you get adorable new characters like this little cutie:

If you want a comic series that truly lives up to all the hype around it then Saga is for you. A beautiful blend of science fiction and fantasy, action and romance, laughs and thrills. As if you hadn’t guessed by now, this is a solid read and deserves nothing less than 5/5 stars. The only drawback is if you don’t have volume 3 on hand when you finish reading this because there’s a definite cliff hanger!