Precinct1313’s End Of The Year Geekstravaganza…

Welcome, fellow fans of fantastic fiction, to Precinct1313’s annual end of the year Geekstravaganza! and, whew! what a year it’s been in the jolly ol’ world of geekdom. Lots of cool and compelling comics, fantastic films and venerable video-games vied for this particular geeks attention, so lets run down our favourite nerdy necessities for your perusal and pleasure!

Favourite Graphic Novel – I Am Not Starfire

I Am Not Starfire was another absolutely fantastic standalone graphic novel brought forth from the prominent pen of Mariko Tamaki, and beset with vivacious visuals from Yoshi Yoshitani, making for another gripping teenage tale of angst and apprehension, but ultimately growth, friendship and inner respect as we follow the trepidatious tale of the distraught daughter of one of the world’s most powerful super-beings. (And you, lucky people, can read our review Right Here)

Favourite Comic-Book Artist – Bilquis Evely

I mean, this is always a highly difficult category to pin down a favourite in. This year as in most the standards in comic visuals has been stellar, with notable nods to Bruno Redondo for his stunning output on Nightwing, and the great Phil Jimenez for his titanic turn on the first issue of Wonder Woman Historia: The Amazons, but the artist whose work shone the brightest for me this year is the bedazzling – Bilquis Evely, whose amazing art graced the Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow series, though this technically came out at the end of 2021, I personally only got around to reading it this year, and it’s phenomenal!

Bilquis’ art is highly distinctive, stunning to behold with beautifully in-depth line work, that when combined with the bold and gorgeous colours of Matheus Lopes are ascended to even greater heights, this is the absolute definition of high-art!

Favourite Feature Film – The Batman

If you know me, then you’ll probably realise this is a bit of a no-brainer, of course Matt Reeves stunning rendition of the Caped Crusader was my favourite film this year, it encapsulated almost everything I’ve ever wanted from a Batman movie, ever since I was first transfixed by the character at the tender age of six years old. Yes, we’ve had lots (and lots) of prior Dark Knights running around Gotham at night in tights, trouncing baddies, yet (for me, at least) none of them really captured that particular bat-magic that the comics and animated movies served up, until now!

Robert Pattinson was perfectly cast as a younger Bruce Wayne/Batman and was phenomenal in the role, ably backed up by an absolutely stellar cast, with Paul Dano, Zoe Kravitz, Andy Serkis, Jeffery Wright and (an almost unrecognisable) Colin Farrell adding their tremendous thespian talents to this grim, gritty noir detective movie… this blew my bat-socks off!

Favourite Video-Game(s) 

So many games, so, so many! I mean my backlog is huge and could probably last me several lifetimes! I played a ton of great games this year, so there honestly couldn’t be only one (Highlander style) choice, so I’ve gone with my top three instead! Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes is a fun, fast and frantic musou style ofshoot from the laudable Fire Emblem: Three Houses and is absolutely the very best Musou game I’ve ever played (it does help that I’m a bit of a FireEmblem fanboy, I guess) Nier Automata without a doubt showcased the very best storytelling and world building I’ve ever seen in a game, an emotional journey through a ravaged world littered with twists, turns and serpentine lore, just remarkable!

My third fave of the year was the astounding – SIFU, a Kung-Fu epic set in modern day China, where you control the actions of the son, or daughter of a martial arts school’s – Sifu, who seeks revenge upon those who murdered their father. Honestly this is one of the best beat-em ups I’ve ever played, it absolutely feels like you’ve been plonked down in the middle of a classic Donnie Yen or Moon Lee martial arts movie! Wonderful visuals and a stunning eastern soundtrack, this game rocks… In fact this game rocks so hard, it thinks it’s Metallica!!

Phew! thanks for sticking with us, fellow agents of Precinct1313, so, what was your favourite Comic-Book, movie or video-game this year? Why not sound off in the comments below… Happy New Year!

Oh, And As Ever… Make Mine DC!

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