The Taking of Pelham 123

It can get pretty lonely up here on Station 59, Nebulon does occasionally find himself wanting for the company of his equals. Lt Kang, Nebulon's aide de camp is fine as far as it goes, but the art of conversation is lost on him.

Usually Nebulon can comfort himself by donning his disguise and visiting his local multiplex. Recently however the background level of homicidal rage I experience on a daily basis has come to the fore as I have come to realise that you humans are seemingly unable to put out a decent movie while your offspring are on their 'summer holidays'.

On Nebulon's world our young are educated in knowledge factories round the clock until they reach maturity, leaving our cinemas mercifully free of screaming kids two steps removed from a sugar induced coma. So in order to prevent our planned invasion from commencing early I have been mostly hanging around the station watching bootleg TV episodes on your internet. It's nice to know that of the intergalactic invasion plans falls through Nebulon may still have a career writing TV shows about maverick cops.

But recently I did break my isolation to watch the Taking of Pelham 123. Let's be straight, it's not the original, and it lacks subtlety, but never the less, it's a big step up from the other trash taking up screen space at the moment. John Travolta chews up the scenery and Denzel Washingtion is as watchable as ever. The pace ticks over a good rate of knots and the script does it's job nicely with one or two clangers here and there, 'Why didn't we just use a helicopter?' asks Mayor James Gandolfini after the squad car with the ransom money in it crashes. Arrrrrrrgh.

In short, this isn't nearly as classic as the original, but it's big, loud and shouty fun without a wizard or talking animal in sight. These days that's the best Nebulon can hope for.

In the mean time, watch the skies earthmen.