I Was On The News!

Hi everybody! I hope everyone's having a good summer! I've been really busy for the past week because I was in a play for the Winnipeg Fringe Theatre Festival! For those who don't know, the Fringe Festival is a national theatre festival all over North America. People from all over the world submit plays for the festival. The plays submitted are chosen at random and even if you don't get picked, you can still be in the festival if you set up and pay for your own theatre venue. There are some good plays, and some bad ones, but overall, the Fringe is my favourite part of the summer! I have been a theatre kid for pretty much all my life, I LOVE watching and performing shows, but this is my first time in a Fringe show and it went great! The show we did was called All I Really Need To Know I Learned By Being In a Bad Play, and I played the lead role, The Narrator. The show is all about the life lessons that can be learned from being in a terrible play. I relate to this show a lot because I have learned and experienced many things that I otherwise would never have learned or experienced if I never got into theatre. The best part of theatre is being an important part of a larger community. As an Aspie, I have a hard time fitting in at school. Unless someone knows me really well, they just think I'm weird. However, in the theatre community, everyone is quirky and they don't care if you're weird because, well, everyone is! The theatre make you feel like you belong. If you are a person who has a hard time fitting in, get into theatre! You will discover your people!

Here is the article and the video: http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/winnipeg-teen-with-asperger-s-syndrome-shines-in-fringe-play-1.3158325

Special thanks to my directors; Theresa, Emily, and Augusta the Stage Manager! Thanks so much for this awesome experience! Thanks so much for your support and I hope to continue working with you for as long as I can! :)

Aidan the Aspie Critic: Inside Out

Welcome to another review that brings you to a place that we all know but never have explored! This is Inside Out!

Inside Out is PIXAR's first offering for 2015. They are releasing another movie later this year to compensate for not releasing a movie last year. The movie is about a little girl named Riley and her emotions, Joy, Anger, Disgust, Fear, and Sadness. Riley's emotions help her through her life from the control centre in her brain, Headquarters. The emotions record all of Riley's memories and keep them safe. Riley's Core Memories, which shape her personality, are protected specially in Headquarters to power the 4 islands of Riley's personality. Riley is a very happy child and she has a nearly perfect and problem-free life. That is, until she and her family move from Minnesota to San Francisco, leaving behind her entire life. A new Core Memory is created, coloured blue, a sad memory. Joy attempts to get rid of it so Riley can stay happy, but Sadness insists it be added to the Core Memory bank. Joy and Sadness, as well as all of the Core Memories both end up getting sucked through the Memory Tube out of headquarters. Without Joy and Sadness, Riley can't feel sad OR happy. Without the Core Memories, Riley is losing what makes her herself. Can Joy and Sadness get back to Headquarters and set everything right? Or will Riley be doomed to a lifetime of depression? Watch Inside Out to find out!

Wow! This movie is FANTASTIC! This is PIXAR's greatest and most emotional movie since Toy Story 3, and that was 5 years ago! While Monsters University and Brave were good, they weren't quite up to the bar that Toy Story 3 set. Inside Out has set that bar even higher! The concept is incredibly original and creative, the characters are all likeable, the animation is fantastic, and the story is really freaking depressing! The performances given by the cast are excellent and the comedy is spot on! The world of Riley's brain is a very well developed world. The movie shows that there are other characters who work in Riley's brain like Riley's imaginary friend, Bing Bong, and other various workers. I do wish the movie showed more of other people's brains. We only get to see Riley's parent's brains and a random pre-teen boy's brain, and those scenes are hilarious, but really brief. You do get to see other various character's brains during the credits, which are also hilarious, but I think more situations like that needed to be added to the main movie. Also, there are a couple are unanswered questions, like "Why are Riley's Anger and Fear male when Riley is a girl? All the other female or male characters have all female or male emotions, so, why doesn't Riley? Subtle gender identity commentary, or just laziness so the movie can be more marketable?" or "Why do Riley's emotions all look nothing like her when all the other character's emotions look like the character?" or "Does Dream Production get material from The Subconscious, Abstract Thought, Long Term Memory, and Imagination Land as well as Riley's day?" etc etc etc. These unanswered questions are a lot less distracting than in Frozen and they don't take away from the overall quality of the movie, they are only nitpicks, so I guess they aren't too much of a problem. This movie isn't also as kid-friendly as PIXAR's other movies. Sure, kids can watch it, but I don't think they will really understand, and the themes of depression might be a bit much for them. This is more of an adult movie, but the kids should still see it. Overall, this is must-see movie this summer! It's fantastic! It is up there with Toy Story 3, Up, and Cars 2 as one of the greatest and most depressing PIXAR movies! Man, Cars 2 was depressing. It was PIXAR's greatest failure and it was depressing that they sunk to that level.... But it's good to know that they've recovered from the Cars 2 incident! I'd give this movie a 4.9 stars out of 5! It's a great feeling to know that PIXAR can still make a movie this good!

Have you seen Inside Out? What did you think of it? Tell me in the comments!

Aidan the Aspie Critic: Jurassic World

Welcome to another review 65 million years in the making! Because that's how long it takes for me to put out one of these reviews... This is Jurassic World!

Jurassic World is the 4th instalment to the Jurassic Park series and is the true sequel to the original 1993 classic, Jurassic Park. Yeah yeah, I know we also have The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III, but those movies are awful and, aside from starring some of the same characters, in no way continue the story from the first movie! Jurassic World finally gives the series the true sequel it deserves! Set 20 years after the events of the first Jurassic Park, the movie is about 2 kids who go on vacation to Jurassic World, a Universal Studios/Disney World style theme park featuring living dinosaurs, to see their Aunt who is one of the directors of the park. At first, things are going great! Sure, the kids' parents are getting divorced and their Aunt is too busy to spend any time with them, but who cares?! There's DINOSAURS!!!!!!! However, it turns out that people are tired of seeing live dinosaurs after the park has been open for 10 years. They want something more! The Jurassic World scientists have created that something. A brand new hybrid dinosaur, the Indominus Rex! But, big surprise, the Indominus Rex breaks out and goes on a rampage throughout the island! Can the kids, their Aunt, a Veloceraptor trainer, and the Jurassic World Veloceraptor security system stop the Indominus Rex's rampage? Watch Jurassic World to find out!

This movie was AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This movie is so fun! There are lots of intense, awesome, and very well done dinosaur chases and fights, the story is simple and engaging, and the characters are likeable! What this movie did great was creating the atmosphere of Jurassic World itself. It actually feels like a place that you can actually visit, and it makes you want to go there, even if you do get eaten by a dinosaur! The acting is good, and there are a lot less scenes that go nowhere than in the first movie. There are still things that weren't explained, but it was more subtle and you forget about it. There is also some good comedy, too! The characters seem more genuine, relatable, and likeable than in the first movie, for the most part. There are no stuttering Jeff Goldblums or jerk lawyers or Al from Toy Story 2 in this movie! There were lots of little references and homages to the original Jurassic Park that are really clever, and I won't DARE spoil them here for you, the reveals are too mind blowing! If there is something bad about this movie, it would be that the special effects aren't very convincing. Like, at all. I never actually felt like the dinosaurs were actually there, I never felt like you could reach out and touch them. Maybe I was half convinced they were real at a couple points, but overall, the dinosaurs look really fake. In the original Jurassic Park, the special effects were a mix of puppets, CGI, costumes, and animatronics. In Jurassic World, it seems they only used CGI. Now, that wouldn't be so bad, but here's the thing. At times, the CGI in this movie looks worse than in the original Jurassic Park! In some scenes, I didn't feel like the dinosaurs were as finely polished or as finely integrated into the scene than in the first movie. This is extremely disappointing, but it's all a matter of how much you care about the special effects. They aren't bad in this movie, some dinosaurs, like the Indominus Rex for example, look great, but there is also lots of slightly sub-par special effects in this movie as well. If you are a special effects enthusiast, this movie leaves a little bit to be desired, but if you care about the story and characters more than the special effects, then I think you'll like this movie a lot better. Overall this is a really fun movie to go see this summer! It's not fantastic, none of the Jurassic Park movies are, even the first one, but it is just awesome! I'd give this movie a 3.9 stars out of 5! Clever girl!

Have you seen Jurassic World? What did you think of it? Tell me in the comments!