Well Happy New Year out there all you dungeon crawlers! It’s officially 2024 but before we start off the new year for real, I thought I would give a little wrap up about what happened here on my blog this year. I’ll also give you a little peek into a few of the things you might see on here in 2024. If you can’t stand this kind of a post, don’t feel like you need to read it, I just like to do a little reflection now and then. I’m just going to be talking about what happened on my blog more or less, not big news stories (for the most part) or anything like that. Let’s see what happened in the categories I covered.

film

I started off the year wanting to review every movie I saw. I failed on that goal because, well, you know, life and stuff. But I started out reviewing one of the oddest movies I have ever seen called Adult Swim Yule Log (AKA The Fireplace). It’s not for everyone but it’s definitely memorable. In January I also reviewed Prey which is best entry the Predator series has had in decades. Horror films in theaters started off fairly strong in the form of M3GAN about an android doll who does what android dolls do and tries to kill everyone. January also had a Friday the 13th in it so I reviewed the last of the Friday the 13th movies I can, Freddy vs. Jason. I’m still hopeful for a 13th movie in the series but we’ll see if that ever actually happens.

In February they rereleased Titanic for a limited time and made me ugly cry as always. On Valentine’s day I watched Picnic at Hanging Rock which is a quiet horror movie with a decidedly creepy vibe which also happens to take place on Valentine’s day. I also watched Tom Hanks be a grumpy old man in A Man Called Otto. February brought with it more Ant-Man in the form of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. It was sort of okay but certainly not Marvel’s best.

In March I watched Idris Elba and Andy Serkis star in Luther: The Fallen Sun. It’s not a bad film at all but it’s definitely got some disturbing stuff in it. Also in March I watched all of the Oscar best picture nominees including All Quiet on the Western Front, Elvis, Top Gun: Maverick, The Fablemans, Avatar: The Way of Water, Everything Everywhere All at Once, The Banshees of Inisherin, Triangle of Sadness, Women Talking, and Tar. Towards the end of March I decided to do a deep dive on the Scream series starting with the movie that saved slasher horror, Scream. I spent the rest of April completing that series of reviews.

In May it was the anniversary of Return of the Jedi so I wanted to give everyone a guide on how to go about watching, reading, playing etc. in the universe of Star Wars. I’ve got a lot left to review on that so stay tuned if you like Star Wars. Also in May I reviewed the entire Fast & Furious franchise starting with the very first movie, The Fast & The Furious. It’s mind boggling how far into ridiculousness these films get.

June saw what was for my money the best animated movie of the year with Spider-Man: Across the Spider-verse.

I didn’t really watch any movies in July actually so nothing to report here.

In August there was a refreshingly independent horror movie called Talk to Me. And a couple of box office juggernauts were launched with Oppenheimer and Barbie. I watched them both but only got around to reviewing the first one. They’re both worth watching though!

In October I reviewed the whole Psycho franchise (excluding the TV series Bates Motel) starting with the first film. I also reviewed the double feature slashers of X and Pearl.

I was a little burned out on movies so didn’t review any others until December when I watched what might have been my favorite film of 2023 and an absolute mastery of storytelling with Godzilla Minus One.

So, what’s coming up on this blog for film for 2024? Well, I can’t say I am overly excited about what is coming to theaters but I’m sure I will review a few things here. I’ll almost certainly review the Oscar picks for best picture. As far as film series to review I think I am going to go with the whole Halloween franchise and the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies. We’ll see if I end up doing any others.

Books

It was a busy year in books for me. In February I read the second volume of the Time Corrector series, The Movement by Avi Datta. It’s a fantastic series and a beautiful book. And I am very excited that I have the third volume which I will be reviewing in early February. I also started reviewing the Empire series by Tim Goff.

In March I read The Underground by Ty Pape. and continued to review Tim Goff’s series with Empire: Capital.

In August I read Empire: Spiral and The Light of the Jedi which is a great entry point if you don’t know much about Star Wars.

In November I read Illyadra by Adriel Wallaker and Drakomunda by Guy Quarterly.

December I read The Badlander by Tom Golden which has an utterly unforgettable ending. I also read To the Solemn Graves which is a solid ghost story anthology by Kim Idynne.

In 2024 you can expect more reviews of independent author’s books from Reedsy. I’m also hoping to but in a few more Star Wars book reviews and couple of reviews for bigger name authors, especially in fantasy and science fiction. I am a slow reader so we’ll see how far I get.

Marvel

I continue my quest to review every Marvel 616 comic in order and I made some progress this year. There is still a ton to go.

I could link every post I did on these this year but my series of reviews is meant to be read from the beginning so I am going to cheat a little and just link you to that first post here. If you read through it, you can link to the next one at the bottom and go in order.

I love Marvel comics and for 2024 I plan to continue with these reviews. I have to take breaks from it here and there because as much as I do love them, these early issues can seem a bit repetitive. Once you’ve seen Thor beat up a bunch of communists you don’t really need to see it again but that just keeps happening. Anyway, as far as Marvel goes on this blog just watch for more of it!

Star Wars

As far as Star Wars goes, as I mentioned above I have a lot left to review. I did come up with a guide for how to get started here. And I managed to review The Light of the Jedi.

For 2024 I’ll be reviewing Into the Dark which is the next book in phase 1 of the High Republic series. I will also probably start reviewing the movies but those are going to be a super deep dive so I’m not sure if I will complete that this year. I’ll be consuming tons of Star Wars stuff as I always to but how much I review basically remains to be seen.

Role Playing Games

Oh boy did a lot happen in the world of TTRPGs this year! There were too many crazy things to cover but the year did not start off well for Wizards of the Coast who makes Dungeons & Dragons. They had a huge debacle in what came to be knows as the OGL well.. debacle. And a ton of other stuff happened too. At the end of 2023 I basically feel better about TTRPGs as a hobby as a whole but D&D really needs to figure itself out as soon as possible if it wants to stay the most popular TTRPG of all time.

In January I gave my recommendations for the Top 5 TTRPGs to play in 2023. Also in January things started happening with the OGL (Open Gaming License) which allows creators to make third party stuff for D&D. But you know what? There are other rules systems and companies out there and people who want to make stuff for TTRPGs can use them. One of my favorites is the Basic Role Playing system by Chaosium. January just went crazy with the whole OGL thing and another company who I would say proved to be one of the best in 2023 was Paizo who makes Pathfinder. I wrote about that here.

In February I gave my picks for great gifts for any game master here. I know, it’s not romantic or whatever but hey, everyone can use dice and stuff like that. There were also a lot of play tests of new games happening in 2023. In particular in February there was the first play test of what was called Project Black Flag but will be known as Tales of the Valiant. It’s got the potential to be a D&D rival but it remains to be seen how popular it ends up becoming.

One of the things I find most difficult about TTRPGs is just finding a group to play consistently. A great way around that is to play solo TTRPG games which is why I cam up with my list of Top 5 Solo TTRPGs in April.

In August I got my hot little hands on a game I am super excited about which combines my love of Marvel comics with my love of TTRPGs. That’s right, I wrote about everything you need to know about the Marvel Multiverse Tabletop Role Playing Game. I also did a review of the core rulebook here and did a breakdown of the first chapter here. I’ll be doing a lot more with this book and this game in 2024 so if you are into Marvel TTRPGs watch for that.

In October I did one of the two things I am most proud of for 2023. I wrote my first scenario for Call of Cthulhu 7th edition called Fantastic Light Display. I worked for more than a month on it and I’m still just really excited to have published anything TTRPG related. This is definitely not for everyone but I had an absolute blast making it.

Also, because it was October, I couldn’t resist giving my recommendations for the Top 5 Monster TTRPGs to play.

In December, the MCDM TTRPG had a crowdfunding kick off and I have to say this is the game I am most excited for coming out in 2024 so expect a lot more written about it right here on this blog.

I had such a great time making my first Call of Cthulhu 7th edition scenario that I decided to do it again. This one is called Trouble on the Rock and is set on Alcatraz island just as the military prison is about to become a federal penitentiary. This is also just the first part as I intend to do two more in the On the Rock series. In February watch for the second in the series called Terror on the Rock. Just to be clear, these are related but stand alone scenarios so you don’t have to play one to enjoy the other. If you are into TTRPGs and like Call of Cthulhu it would be awesome if you could spread the word about it!

In 2024 you can expect more posts about how to play TTRPGs, more Top 5 lists, and definitely more scenarios, adventures etc written by yours truly!

Stories by Me

I definitely didn’t write as many short stories in 2023 as I intended to but I still got a few out.

In January I wrote Resolutions. Never try to grow tomatoes is my advice.

In February I wrote about Twenty Years of Walking Away and a story called Invasion. I also posted a story called Space Walk. That story actually first appeared in a collection called Flashbang! Volume II featuring a bunch of independent authors. I just wanted everyone to enjoy my story for free as well if they wished to.

In September I had another story featured in a collection called In a Flash. Again, it features a whole lot of independent authors and they are all flash fiction stories so it’s a nice small bite of fiction for when you don’t have a lot of time.

And as I said in the section above, I published my first two Call of Cthulhu 7th edition scenarios. These are not technically stories but they are written by me and I hope people enjoy them. I’m not trying to make anyone spend a dime on anything I write unless they want to but if you do, buying those scenarios is the best way currently to show your support for this blog.

In 2024 I definitely want to bring back my Flash Fiction Friday series and hopefully have a few good stories for you to read. I absolutely am not going to have one for every Friday of the year but I’ll do what I can!

I’m also working on a novel, but I’ll tell you more about that once I get to a point where I think it’s really worth sharing something. I’m not sure what all else I will get up to as far as writing goes this year but you can definitely expect more blog posts!

Heading into 2024

There are a lot of things I am excited for in the coming year and I hope you’ll decide to keep reading some of my posts whether you enjoy my fiction, my reviews of books and movies, my nerding out about Star Wars and Marvel and TTRPGs or all of the above. I hope everyone has an incredible 2024 and I wish all of you a Happy New Year!

Annually yours,

Slick Dungeon