Tag: Riverdale

Upgraded (2024)

You’ve been upgraded!

Rating 15
Length 1h44
Release 09.02.2024
Director Carlson Young
About An aspiring art intern is invited on a last-minute work trip to London, where she meets a handsome stranger.
Moon: no moon sighting
Where to Watch: Amazon Prime Exclusive
Trailer:

The Good

Riverdale alum Camila Mendes proves yet again she’s lead material by following high school rom-com love letter to Clueless (Do Revenge) with a rom-com of a more grown up affair. She’s born for the rom-com and has easy chemistry with everyone.
She also provides the audience with a charming, hard-working, character who you want to root for.

Anthony Stewart Head, a man who had my heart from the moment he slammed that book down in front of Buffy in Sunnydale’s Library. It’s safe to say that he is a wonderful addition to anything in which he’s in (and I mean that! audiobook, tv, film and even theatre).
This is no exception. Head plays a scene-stealing artist that is able to see Ana for who she is.

The film follows a trusted romantic story arc, without delving into the darker side of what essentially boils down to fraud, and it doesn’t mind diverting itself away from some of the more obvious choices.

The Bad

I would have like to have had both Ana and William have more friends around them. Yes, Ana has her work friend who is great, but she’s only ever used to move the plot along.
There’s no way William, with that upbringing and parties, doesn’t have a group of friends who would cheer him on, or thwart his romance.

The Ugly

The ugly step-sister trope.
Yup, utterly stunning assistants; rotten to the fucking core! They’re panto-level horrible and I’d love to replace them with something a little more nuanced. Or subtle.

Final Thoughts

A pretty decent, and much needed, rom com with a lead who will hopefully give us many more over the coming years.

Book Review: Good Girl, Bad Blood by Holly Jackson

Publishers: Electric Monkey
Pages: 432
Book Birthday: 30.4.2020
How I Got It: Bought at 1am, for my Kindle as I couldn’t wait any longer
About: Pip Fitz-Amobi is not a detective anymore.
With the help of Ravi Singh, she released a true-crime podcast about the murder case they solved together last year. The podcast has gone viral, yet Pip insists her investigating days are behind her.
But she will have to break that promise when someone she knows goes missing. Jamie Reynolds has disappeared but the police won’t do anything about it. And if they won’t look for Jamie then Pip will, uncovering more of her town’s dark secrets along the way… and this time EVERYONE is listening.
But will she find him before it’s too late? Perfect for fans of One of Us Is Lying, Eva Dolan, C L Taylor, We Were Liars and Riverdale

Characters

  • Being a sequel, the characters we met in the first instalment are built upon. Pip, our returning protagonist, not only grows further in this book, she demonstrates elements of PTSD. Her relationship with Ravi blooms, while not overwhelming the story.
  • I love that we get to discover move about Connor and others from the previous book. It actually showed what a wealth of characters Jackson built within her literary world.
  • I did feel that there were behaviours left unexplored and unresolved (I’m not going to say who, as that then may eliminate people from your suspect list). It didn’t leave me unsatisfied, but hoping for another sequel.

Plot

  • The narrative takes on a new case that has few links to Pip’s previous. It perhaps has more callbacks than another crime book may have, however it’s very clear that for Pip, these are personal as much as professional.
  • In fact this book had, for me, all the feels of the beloved Veronica Mars. That was an amazing show that build itself up like a braid; new story, new cases but keeping hold of strands from the past.
  • I loved all the elements within the plot; the court case being resolved alongside this new, missing persons, case. I enjoyed how the adults responded to the ongoings and Pip’s involvement.

Writing

  • Told in the third person, Good Girl, Bad Blood is still a highly emotive story. I connected with Pip and really felt her anger, pain and helplessness. When my reading seems primarily made up of first person, this makes for a refreshing change.
  • I was worried that having a kindle edition would botch up some of the formatting, but it was perfect. It made good use of differing fonts and layouts to differentiate between narrative, audio and journal logs. Its a clever way of presenting the evidence as Pip discovers it and adds, rather than detracts, from the pace.

Final Thoughts

I loved every moment of this book. Had it not been for quarantine and the restlessness that has come with it, I’d have read this in one sitting as I had the first.