- DB
Words
Pretty much all you have in a written format.
I've said before that me writing these posts and having this website isn't to gain any fame or even an audience, but more a very mild form of therapy by getting my thoughts out about movies, games and TV (and sometimes other things too) as I just found myself re-watching and re-playing the same things over and over again, which meant I wasn't really trying out as much new stuff as I would've liked.
In that respect, it's certainly worked as there are plenty of films and games that I would've ignored completely over the last few years if I didn't have this outlet. And no, writing it down in a notebook or even something like a Word document wouldn't really have worked as I could easily misplace or forget about either of those and slip back into sticking to what I found familiar.
On the other hand, the internet doesn't ever really forget about anything, so it seems fit for purpose and it's also been useful as something to refer back to myself or even let friends read if they want to know what I thought about something. To go along with that though, is the fact that the internet is also a public place and I've always felt a certain responsibility about that.
What I mean is that I've felt I should make a bit of an effort for anyone who happens to stumble across this site - if they want to read a review, I'd want them to feel like it was worth the time even if they disagreed with what I wrote, but lately I've been feeling differently about that, with less and less time being available in my spare time and remembering that this site really is for me - if others like it too, that's just a bonus.
The problem I've had in the past, including very recently with last week's Jaws of Hakkon review post, is that sometimes I just don't have that much to say about a piece of media and so writing the posts can sometimes feel more like a chore than a relief, so I won't be padding things out going forward. I'm still going to be giving my honest opinion on all the media I write about, but only as much as I'm genuinely interested in writing.
Just as a little preview, I saw the fourth John Wick movie recently and will be writing a review post of it, but it will most likely be very, very short as there really isn't all that much I want to say about it - it might well be only two or three paragraphs long, in fact. If I've said the things that I felt most important about it (or anything else to come), then I don't see the point in wasting my time - or yours - padding out a review just to boost the word count a bit.
And that's not to say it'll only be 'non-good' things that'll get short reviews either. If I loved watching or playing something and have only good things to say about it, I'm not just going to list them out and go over everything I like unless I really feel I need to explain why - hopefully what I write, however brief, will get over just how much I like something that will serve the same purpose as writing a much longer piece.
I've repeatedly said that I'm a reviewer by exception, by which I mean that if I don't bring something up then that means it's generally served the purpose of whatever the media was trying to achieve and therefore isn't worthy of being singled out for praise or criticism, depending on whatever's merited. As an example, if the score of a movie did the basics of enhancing the on-screen action and serving to complete the work, but was neither bad enough to be criticised or good enough to deserve praise, then it simply won't be mentioned.
I'm just going to be taking that approach to a much greater degree, so what you'll be getting in the text of any review posts going forward will be my core impressions taken away from any piece of media and what I felt most needed talking about. This will hopefully save me a lot of time when I don't have much to say, and the review of John Wick: Chapter 4 next week will be the first example of what I'm talking about.
