November Hits and Misses
What’s the best and worst of November? We tell you what we think.
HITS
Movie: Interstellar (Joanna)
Christopher Nolan is known for his visually stimulating, mind blowing long movies, such as The Dark Knight Trilogy and Inception. His latest three hour film, Interstellar, definitely lives up to his signature style. In Interstellar, Matthew McConaughey stars as Cooper, a widowed farmer living in a future world that is battered from global warming and is suffering from a food shortage. Earth is no longer suitable for human life, and NASA is attempting to discover a new planet for human colonization. In order to save the human population on Earth, Cooper must make a choice between watching his children grow up and travelling to space to find a new planet suitable for human colonization. The film takes you through a fascinating and exhilarating ride through space, black holes, and different galaxies, and leaves you feeling utterly mind blown. My meager knowledge on physics was not enough to keep up with the complicated ideas in this film. However, McConaughey gives an outstanding performance as a loving father who sacrifices his own happiness for the sake of humanity. I cried.
Album: 1989 – Taylor Swift (Joanna)
Ever since her latest album came out, Taylor Swift has been dominating the covers of various magazines over the past couple of weeks, with Newsweek confidently claiming that “Taylor Swift IS the music industry.” I used to be among those people who viewed Taylor Swift as whiney and annoying. However, Taylor has taken a turn in her newest album, “1989”. Firstly, she has officially changed her music genre from country to pop. Her new album consists of extremely catchy and upbeat tunes, like “Blank Space” and “Shake It Off,” to slower ballads, like “Wildest Dreams” and “You R In Love.” Swift really wears her heart on her sleeve in this album and doesn’t try to be something she’s not, unlike many wannabes in mainstream music today. After having this album on repeat for several weeks, I can officially say that I am a converted Taylor Swift fan.
Drink: Snow Maple Toffee Latte (Bernice)
Oh, Starbucks, after six months of disappointing drinks (Azuki Matcha and Creamy Vanilla with Lemony Swirl), you’re finally getting it right. Granted, drinking a Starbuck’s seasonal winter latte is acknowledging the beginning of everyone’s favourite (maybe second to Halloween) holiday. I would even go as far to say it’s traditional to drink Starbuck’s seasonal drink during the holiday season. So you can imagine my excitement on seeing a full blown picture of the Snow Maple Toffee Latte surrounded by Christmas decorations. And when I saw that toffee is an ingredient in the mixture, I may or may not have squealed a little. The best part? The crunchy bits on the top of the drink. And while it is sweet, it’s not as sweet as a White Mocha, so you can drink the whole cup without feeling the need to run to the water fountain.
MISSES
TV Show: How to Get Away with Murder (Bernice)
Shonda can do no wrong. No one can dispute that fact, even after watching just one season of Grey’s Anatomy or Scandal. Therefore when How to Get Away with Murder came out, I had great expectations. But Shonda, you really let me down. My main problem with the TV show is its repetitive nature. Even though every episode of Grey’s and Scandal re-uses a similar structure where main characters gets a new case to work on, they never re-used scenes. However, throughout How To Get Away With Murder’s first season, the fastforward scenes were re-used tediously. The intention of the fastforward scenes seems to be to intrigue and leave us wanting more; instead, we found ourselves rolling our eyes and groaning “this again?”. We get that someone was murdered, and that the characters are scared and trying to cover up the murder. We already established that in the first episode, and second, and the third. There is really no need to continue to expand on an idea that has been milked so dry.
Song: 7/11 – Beyonce (Joanna)
Beyonce’s killer voice is no where to be found on her newest track, 7/11, which relies solely on generic beats and autotuned vocals. After her previous album, self-titled “Beyonce”, I’ve come to expect more from Queen B. Beyonce’s music usually stands out from the crowd of boring, wannabe songs we hear so much of these days. However, if I heard “7/11” on the radio and did not know who was singing it, I would have thought it was just some common wannabe singer hoping to make it onto the Billboard Top 100 chart. The song’s beat is nothing special, and I get the irritating feeling that Beyonce is succumbing to the flood of dull mainstream music. You can do better, Beyonce!
