A. J. Black
@ajblack
Author • Write about Film/TV & podcast @filmstories.bsky.social • Physical media collector • All the details: linktr.ee/ajblackwriter
Finished this last night. Injury Time by David Goldblatt. One for football fans primarily, but this weaves in politics and culture as it diagnoses the parlous state of football as a sport underneath all of the entertainment. It’s quite depressing to read actually 😀 but well done by Goldblatt.
Second best feeling to winning the World Cup as an Englishman? Watching this ghastly bunch of nasty POS Argentina players lose comprehensively. Viva Espana! 🇪🇸
Bloody delighted at the Villa tonight. Didn’t just win the final, they won it easily. Up the Villa! Onwards to the Champions League!
You know you’re British and of a certain age when you see this title, Gary, and in your head whenever you read it you hear ‘Gaaaarrry’.
A lovely Saturday afternoon treat just popped through the letterbox. A further addition to my extended Bond scores collection. Bonkers film, this, but one with a great John Barry score.
Popped up last night on BBC Radio 2’s Midnight Mastermind after being invited on to chat a 90s movie and quiz the host on it. Got an @atthe90smovies.bsky.social plug in too! Listen in for what the subject is, then check out the rest on BBC Sounds here from 36:05! www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...
A thing of absolute beauty came today. £90 and a very long wait but it’ll obviously be worth it. #Thunderbirds
Pluribus, three episodes in, really reminds me in places of an old X-Files episode ‘Je Souhaite’, which Vince Gilligan also wrote/directed, where a genie grants wishes. Mulder wishes for ‘peace on Earth’ and the genie takes it literally, wiping everyone but him off the face of the planet.
Happy New Year all! If you’re here for writing, I’m hoping to get more on the table in January, including beginning a new project looking at Film in 2001 for reliablenarrator.co.uk If you’re here for podcasts, this month expect takes on 1998’s Ronin, the new 28 Years Later, Agnes Varda & more.
By no means a finished list, as I’ve not seen at all everything in 2025, but here’s how I’m finishing the year on Letterboxd. Top 12 and bottom 12. Some great stuff at the top, some utter gash down below.
Last night, my old podcasting chums @ckjsweeney.bsky.social @rmuldrake.bsky.social & @sarahlblair.bsky.social wrapped the final episode of our #TheXFiles podcast, The X-Cast. An emotional and meaningful recording that I think we did justice, celebrating a 10 year journey. Dropping NYE.
Look what came through the Santa post today! Technically my 5th time in print, contributing to my friend @bazgreenland.bsky.social’a excellent tome about the Doctor Who Christmas specials. My essay is on 2013’s ‘The Time of the Doctor’, the conclusion to an epic narrative. Looks good on the shelf!
Very pleased to get my latest copy of Film Stories @filmstories.bsky.social, in which tying into a general boxing theme, I chat a few underappreciated films from that sport sub-genre. A bevy of writers delivering great material here for a good price. Get a copy. filmstories.co.uk/news/film-st...
And so continues the genuinely bonkers career of Lily James. I mean good on her, because I absolutely imagined she’d spend her career doing Richard Curtis comedies and period dramas, not playing Pammy and taking on Stallone sequels, yet here we are. Hope this is as fun as the first Cliffhanger.
This is perhaps the most terrifying book I’ve ever read. It’s brilliant and reads like a thriller, but I wish I’d never read it. Might never sleep again.