Set List: High Precision Ball Bearings

Set List at the Pack is brought to you by: High Precision Ball Bearings! So round! So precise! Rolling so smooth you won't believe it! 

It's okay.  The audience didn't like it much either. 

#2,315: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

99 Homes - ★★★☆☆
I'm perpetually at my most delighted when I see a movie I've never heard of before it starts. This is a classic first-half movie: digging into the world and characters is fun, but when The Plot comes smashing down, the wheels start to come off.

Cop Car - ★★★★☆
Watched this out of Spider-hype as much as anything. The kids were younger than I was expecting. The movie was better than I was expecting. Somehow, the setting makes it feel like a solid double feature with 99 Homes. Good work, everybody!

Nocturnal Animals - ★☆☆☆☆
As the French would say, "pretentious nonsense." Marvel at the symbolism! Thrill to the incredible reading montage!

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - ★★☆☆☆
It seems like Potter fans found it pretty satisfying, which is probably the most important thing, but it's kind of a weird movie. It's not that nothing happens so much as that the characters might not be relevant to the plot.

Set List: Booty!

Set List at the Pack is brought to you this week by: Booty!  (You know, the spoils of war?)

It's worth its weight in gold! Get yours in the lobby today!

Escape Room Reviews: The Pirate's Den

Company: MagIQ
Room: Pirate’s Den
Date Played: 1/5/17
Player Count: 2. We could have easily had one or two more.
Success:  Success!

Premise: Treasure is inherently desirable. Pirates have treasure.

Immersion: Some props were a little well-worn, but the pirate ship looked great! It's fun to be able to look through the portholes and see 'outside.' This room is low tech and lock-based.

Highlights: This room had a fun variety of things to do. Although some puzzle types are repeated, they are accompanied by some fun objects that look like they belong on board the ship. The end game was exciting and felt urgent, even though we didn't know how much time was left on the clock.

Lowlights: Succeeding in this room requires a lot of Spot Hidden checks, which is an area where we sometimes come up short when playing as a duo. More eyes means finding more secrets faster!  One of the locks, even though we knew what we were looking for, we never found it and I forgot to ask the GM after. (We spun the last dial of the lock.)  Another puzzle was so well-worn that clues were no longer necessary. 

And Finally:   Thanks to a groupon we didn't want to expire, this room made for a fun date night. I had the prejudice that it was perhaps meant for kids (the room can be adjusted to suit birthday parties and such), and even that the *IQ locations around town were somehow 'less than' other companies, but that's all stuff and nonsense. It kept us busy for most of an hour, had some depth we weren't expecting, and it was fun. Out of 16 rooms played, this room takes the #7 spot away from last week's review.

How to book this room yourself: Visit https://magiqescaperoom.com/los-angeles/pirates

#2,311: Arrival

To Be - ★★½☆☆
I was talking with a friend who remembered this existentially terrifying (and of course Canadian) cartoon he'd seen as a kid, and tracked it down for myself. It's a little bit long.

Special Delivery - ★★½☆☆
Another from the same animator as To Be, John Weldon. This one won the Oscar™ for best animated short. I don't love it, but it does seem like a more interesting time for the short film Oscars™. It's on YouTube.com here. 

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy - ★★★½☆
I'm pretty sure this was a rewatch, but I had no memory of what actually happens in this movie. It's like a puzzle box I can enjoy anew from start to finish each time I come back to it.

Arrival - ★★★★★
Great! I know we're just getting into the season*, but I wonder if this isn't my best picture pick. It's a nominee, at least, since sci-fi won't win it. As a generalization, I love it when a movie that is not a romance doesn't have a romance, and it's kind of clever how they get to have it both ways here. All the linguistic stuff really (ahem) speaks to me too. Fake etymology is one of my favorites of the fake sciences. Or, the fake humanities, I guess. I'm looking forward to having had seen it again some time. 

*Sorry, that must seem a little bit insane. The capsule reviews are usually done sort of close to when I saw the movie, but they print each week here four at a time. If I get too far ahead you end up seeing me speculate about awards season after it's over.  I can see how it would make more sense to publish in a timely fashion, or to post a new blog every time I rack up four movies, but... that's not what this is right now.

Also, like all movie reviewers, my star ratings are arbitrary and meaningless, and totally bendable by payola, if anyone's got some to spare.