Some of My Favourite Media:
Lotte's Latest Highly Rated:
LOTTE
Hi! I’m Lotte, and I’m a ~creative~. Before developing a deepy unhealthy obsession with figure skating, I spent most of my free time making stuff, mostly drawing and sewing. Nowadays I don’t have that much time because I’m always at the rink, but I still try to get some sewing done on the weekends.
My standard for media honestly isn’t very high. The most important thing to me is whether something is fun. I don’t believe liking things that are “grimdark” makes you edgy and cool. We get it, life sucks sometimes. Why would you want it to also suck in the worlds you escape to for fun? At the same time, not every piece of media needs to be happy and light. What I like most are light-hearted stories that also happen to deal with difficult themes, and dark stories with a good dose of comic relief.
One thing I struggle with as a reviewer is negativity. I don’t like to be negative about things that other people love. At the same time, that is what I am sometimes called to do on the site, and I don’t want to refrain from giving my opinion just because others might disagree with it. I also know that negative reviews are often the most fun to write, and the most fun to read. I’d like to stress that even when I think something is hot garbage, my opinion shouldn’t matter to you if you love that thing. If you really like Cloud Atlas I definitely don’t think you have poor taste – it just differs from mine. Man, I hated Cloud Atlas, though…
- Seemingly dumb ideas with excellent execution
- Shows and movies with excellent premises and ideas that constantly miss the mark on their execution so you end up comically frustrated but somehow also inspired
- Proper lgbtqia+ and bipoc representation
- Character driven stories
- Things that are both high-stakes AND funny – now that’s realism
- Worldbuilding that is incomprehensible and boring/politics where politics aren’t called for.
- Poor writing or otherwise bad use of the chosen medium.
- Mistreatment of, and violence against oppressed groups to make things “grimdark”
- Male characters who are rude to everyone but are snarky and good at A Thing so we’re expected to like them? Learn to be nice.
- Board games
Pet PeeveS
Strawman feminism where the bad guy is so cartoonishly sexist that you can easily frame your boring protagonist as a woke girlboss
People who know nothing about corsets, writing about characters wearing corsets (literally do not get me started on this)
Movies that start with a block of text as if I’m gonna read that shit
Ugly costumes. Why.
Games without horses or dogs. WHY.
Thing that has dragon in the title but no dragon in the content. This should be illegal.
Recent Contributions
Review: Web van Angst – Arlette Krijgsman
In the city-state of Agathon, citizens must take a daily drug called peras to suppress their fear. This is vital because the fears of the inhabitants of Agathon manifest as Daimons: shadow monsters that can only be controlled by “Apaten”. At the prestigious Ataraxia Academy, Clara is training to become an Apaat, until one night she and her friends find themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, and her whole world is turned upside down.
Review: Blade Runner 2049 – Denis Villeneuve
In 2049, androids have replaced humans as blade runners – androids are now hunting their own kind. When K is sent to retire a particular android, a peculiar find under the roots of dead tree sets him on the trail of something equally impossible and dangerous: an android that was born. Over the course of his investigation, he finds out about his own origins as well.
Review: Blade Runner – Ridley Scott
Rick Deckard is a blade runner, a bounty hunter tasked with seeking out – and taking out – rogue androids who have infiltrated society. When he is faced with a particularly dangerous group of the newest models, his conscience starts troubling him when he begins having difficulty telling them apart from humans.
Review: Total Recall – Paul Verhoeven
Based (rather loosely) on Philip K. Dick’s 1966 short story We Can Remember It For You Wholesale, Verhoeven’s 1990 cult classic is a weird amalgamation of senseless violence, aged effects, mediocre acting and a thought-provoking concept.
Review: Minority Report – Steven Spielberg
This Spielberg film is loosely based on ‘The Minority report’, a 1956 short story by Philip K. Dick. It takes the story’s premise of a police agency that prevents crimes on the basis of predictions of the future, and a police chief whose life is turned upside down when it is predicted he will commit a murder himself. Hollywood adds Tom Cruise, an innovative near-future cyberpunk visual style, action-packed chase scenes, and a twisting plot.