I’d originally meant to do a bit of an update in February, so this is a little late, but here’s some media I’ve been enjoying and writing I’ve been up to.

I’m a few weeks into changing my hours at work. This massively helped with editing Casual Trek in the first couple of weeks and practicing with Affinity. I’ve yet to use it on any of my prose projects, but for RPGs, reviews and comics it’s been good.

The Living Dead Series

I listen to Jordan D White and Stefan Lawrence’s Nature Trail to Hell, and as a horror fan with a lot of blind spots, it’s been a good reasons to catch up with series. It got me to finish watching the varied Purge and Saw movies. I bought the Leprechaun movie boxed set and sent it to a charity shop the second I was finished. Their new season is the Romero movies which I have seen, but was happy for an excuse to go back to them.

Night of the Living Dead had an interesting legal status, so I was surprised when it wasn’t on any streaming service. Feeling too lazy to find my DVDs, I ended up finding a copy on YouTube which meant dealing with ads. I’ve since found my “Trilogy of the Dead” boxed set and DVDs of Land & Diary.

Night of the Living Dead still holds up, it’s such a good movie, especially for its time. While Dawn expands the concept, there’s something great about the locked box of the house and watching people losing their minds inside.

I’ve seen Dawn twice and while it does meander, I’ve come to appreciate the pace and the quiet moments in with the madness.

Super Mario Quest 2025

I was concerned that I wasn’t keeping good pace with how long Super Mario Bros II was taking, so once I finished it, I blitzed through Super Mario Bros III. The level design was fantastic and you could see the evolutionary steps which would lead to Super Mario World.

Before diving into Super Mario World itself though, I had Super Mario Land on the Game Boy to finish. It’s an incredibly short game and while it looks a little off compared to the other Mario games, it’s still a worthy part of the saga.

Once I got to Super Mario World, I was stoked. It’s such a joy to play. When I was a kid, my dad would rent a SNES before we could afford one of our own. My brother and I would take turns going through levels, using save slot C in order to lessen the likelihood of other people going over it. This meant I had an intricate memory of about 50% of the levels and while I’ve started it numerous times on different consoles, this was the first time I’d finished it without my brother.

After that I played Super Mario Land II: Six Golden Coins which was another joyous experience, albeit an incredibly short one. I’m currently working my way through Super Mario World II: Yoshi’s Island. I was a little dubious about adding it to my list, but it’s been fun so far. I’m about halfway through as of writing, and hopefully I’ll be through it soon, then onto the world of 3D Mario games.

Conclave

It’s nice going to the cinema and just watching a very good film. Not part of a franchise or a spectacle, but a good story that’s one and done. The pope is dead and Ralph Fiennes has to organise the conclave where the new pope will be decided. You’ve got a couple of extremist popes in the running, John Lithgow as the obviously dodgy candidate and The Tuch, who doesn’t want the role but knows he’ll be better than the alternatives.

The environment of being locked down to some places which are simultaneously gorgeously old and bleakly modern creates a space for drama to get heightened. Fiennes keeps wanting to avoid drama, but acts as a magnet for it, uncovering surprise cardinals, affairs and more. As all of this is happening, there’s unrest outside, just out of view. While it’s no Young Pope, it was a very good watch.

Comics

I’d stalled out on reading 2000 AD as I’d read the issues I was trying to write about in a blitz about a year ago. I decided that as I wasn’t going to move further until I’d written something, I’ve been going back and rereading those issues. It’s been good fun revisiting them and having a bit more time to ponder the stories there.

My X-Men marathon’s up to X-Necrosha, an event I only read one part of back in the day as I wasn’t quite getting everything X-related back then. I think I was in more of a DC place. Selene, former Black Queen of the Hellfire Club, wants good hood and her thematically-powered entourage help raise a massive techno-zombie army. Unlike a lot of events it’s actually split between three distinct stories. New Mutants has Warlock show up just in time to get betrayed by his BFF, the reanimated Doug Ramsey. X-Men Legacy moves over to Muir Island and has a returned Proteus & Destiny causing havoc. The ‘main’ story of Necrosha happens in X-Force as that’s where Selene builds her ‘Necrosha’ and the team have to figure out how to stop her. It’s also where you get the giant god bum.

Charlie Makes Words

Sprigs & Kindling issue two has been released. It’s a Carved from Brindlewood fan zine and issue two’s dedicated to The Between. I’ve contributed a little Unscene about the building of the London Underground and have put my name down for two more issues in July and October.

You can get Sprigs & Kindling here.

Past Futuremann’s almost completed, with only covers and lettering left to do. I think I may have found a home for the initial printing of it, which is exciting. I’m also in talks with an artist about Amnesiac City and need to start looking for an artist for the action-packed Let’s All Kill Mark Larkin.

Upcoming I’m going to be looking at Embers which I might be benching until November, Lightning which I’ve got some big thoughts about messing with and a few RPG reviews I want to publish.