Iridium Wrestling Camp Review: A Comprehensive Look

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All time posts are reviewed before posting live.

Akemashite Omedetou! Heri ya Mwaka Mpya! How’s everything going with you as we’re now at the halfway point of the decade? Much like 2023, 2024 was another sparse year for the blog content-wise. I didn’t do a lot of reviewing and had a several months-long hiatus. It was surprising that I managed to have a 10/10 review which I haven’t done in a while with Do The Right Thing and how I reviewed my first concert film with My Epic’s Loriella: The Film. Those were highlights of sorts for me even if my blog overall didn’t get much attention.

This year was hectic with many things happening, some people I knew passed away that were close to me, being busy in general, and some vacations including my first time out-of-state this decade when I went to Philadelphia to see some tourist sites, go on a Black History walking tour, and to see a Progress Wrestling show live in person where I even met people who were featured on my posts before such as Sunshine Machine (Chuck Mambo and TK Cooper), Cheeky Little Buggers (Alexxis Falcon and Charles Crowley), Man Like Dereiss, Rhio, and Gene Munny. Charles Crowley even recommended my blog to his tag team partner and said I did a great job in reviewing since I’ve watched his works such as You Are Cordially Invited and Theatre of Wrestling. Now, let’s check out the most-viewed posts of 2024!

Most Viewed Posts of 2024

Here’s a first time entry into my Year End Retrospectives! Did anyone remember when I reviewed this Colombian movie from 2010? I didn’t expect my review to get this much attention in 2024. Colors of the Mountain was a movie I remember enjoying with a timely subject matter given what was happening in Colombia at the time with the civil war and sociopolitical tensions that still happened after the fact years later. It seems like some people around the world have been enjoying what I think of this movie and other films distributed from Film Movement. This was a great story with a lot of heart, but not afraid to shy away from the subject matter of war and political instability as the local kids just want to play soccer. I know I made a few Sandlot comparisons, but losing a Babe Ruth-autographed baseball to a yard with a bulldog is nothing compared to landmines around the village. That’s more than just trouble. People could literally be dead where they stand if they’re in the wrong place, to paraphrase a character played by a certain actor who passed away in 2024 from The Sandlot even if that is far from this person’s most famous movie despite ending up in many baseball films (that’s James Earl Jones, for those scoring at home).

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Here’s another first-time entry into my retrospective from something I reviewed back in 2018 after seeing this film years prior to this blog existing. Sophie Scholl: The Final Days is one of my favorite WWII period pieces that involved the true story of the titular person who was a German university student and her peers exposing the grave horrors of the Nazi regime when people didn’t even believe things like concentration camps were happening under the 3rd Reich. It is a powerful, yet tragic watch and it’s no wonder why Scholl and company are revered as heroes in Germany for her brave work despite the horrific injustices happening while showing that there were people against Hitler’s regime. I didn’t even know about this story until I watched it on a whim either in my late teens or early 20s if memory serves me correctly, but I was glad to have revisited it back then to write my thoughts on this overlooked film.

For 3 years in a row, the 70s anime version of The Little Mermaid has been in my year-end retrospectives, and I think it’s my most viewed anime post of all time. I have theories of this getting a huge jump in views with Disney’s live-action remake presumably like how my Mulan: Rise of a Warrior review got a boost when that live-action version happened, but that’s a story for another day. Sometimes I wonder if I was too harsh in hindsight even if I liked things about this version and how it was way more accurate to the original story compared to the more famous version with Ariel and company.

This documentary shows up for three years in a row at the #7 spot on my Year End List. How does this keep on happening? If this was a slot machine, this would be a jackpot with three 7s in a row all being the same thing! A Class Divided was an interesting watch and quite relevant decades after the fact with Jane Elliott’s anti-racism tests in her rural Iowan hometown of Riceville. I manged to get lots of views and a teacher contacted me thanking me for my review as well as asking me tips on how to use this documentary in the classroom. While I have some issues with what Elliott has said in recent years, it was fascinating learning about some of these tests and social experiments she conducted. Jane Elliott is actually still alive and is 91 years old at the time of this post.

Iran is getting representation on this list and it involves a review I did a few years ago. The Wind Will Carry Us was a contemplative watch much like the other works I’ve seen from the same director known for his poetic works. It’s certainly not something that Hollywood would make unless it was all glammed up with special effects and a massive budget, but it shows how no one needs to do that when making an engaging and artsy film. Well, here’s another example from Abbas Kiarostami. This docufiction work from this director was certainly creative with a unique story and neorealistic presentation of someone pretending to be a film director. In this case, this imposter was trying to be Mohsen Makhmalbaf who actually stars in this movie for the later scenes. Close-Up was certainly an artsy take involving a story that looks so believable that one would think it’s a documentary out of context unless you look at the right signs to show this was staged. I didn’t think anyone would care about my reviews involving this and the previous Iranian movie.

Extremis returns to be in my top 10 most viewed annual posts. While it wasn’t my favorite Netflix documentary, it was worthwhile and a short watch. I still wonder why anyone would want to know what I thought about this particular medical documentary involving dying patients. It’s definitely a tough watch which I won’t deny, but I don’t believe it got much attention when I released this review years ago.

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2024 must have been a really good year for people checking out foreign dramas on this blog and for Film Movement-affiliated works. This next example involves the 2013 remake of The Nun. It certainly wasn’t my favorite movie when I watched it back in 2017 and I felt really uncomfortable watching it at multiple times. After finding out who signed that petition to support Roman Polanski, this movie would be harder to watch in hindsight knowing that Isabelle Huppert plays a major role in the 2nd half of the movie, and that’s not counting one piece of cultural appropriation against Arab culture in one of her later films, but that’s a story for another day. I still refuse to believe that this is my 2nd most-viewed post of all time on this blog, how someone apparently cited it on an academic paper, or this post getting so many searches over the past couple of years.

Mickey Mouse Monopoly debuted in 2001, but so many of the points are still relevant or even stronger in hindsight. With as many views as this gotten despite barely anyone paying attention when it was posted in 2021 (although I did have good comments with a few fellow bloggers), I’m surprised people didn’t try to argue with me or saying I’m some stupid woke SJW. That or some Disney adult getting triggered even if they most likely can’t construct a sound counterargument against my points. So many things make this documentary more relevant in these times like the commercialization, bullying with their business strategies, and racism in multiple movies. Obviously, Disney bought out far more companies after this was released, they haven’t owned up to all the examples of racist characters and depictions (the hyenas being one example since I believe Disney and most fans actually think most Black and Latinx people are just like them while using Black cast members and Lebo M as melanin shields), or how that infamous wrongful death lawsuit months ago was insane with how Disney used their streaming service’s user agreement to try to get out of any courtroom drama. They got massive backlash (deservedly so), and were forced to amend their user agreement most likely due to save face. With someone literally dying after eating food with allergens at Disney World and the backlash, surely the public would stop supporting Mickey Mouse wholesale afterwards right? Oh wait, the #1 movie in the box office during the Thanksgiving season was Moana 2 and at the time of this review, the #1 movie is currently that cursed Mufasa: The Lion King CGI-fest/not-live-action prequel. I’m sure these fans are happy to get their nostalgia fix regardless of the cultural appropriation, not owning up to plagiarism with the music, or feeling superior to anime fans or people who watched Kimba that a white lion got to be a villain and how Mufasa (SPOILER WARNING!) actually kills the white lion bad guy’s son as a symbolic victory for them. The hypocrisy from this company and their fans is sickening that someone died, but they still support them. Walt’s corporation could kill people at their theme parks or slaughter a town in an African nation, and people will still shell out their bucks to watch their movies. Would Dreamworks or Warner Brothers Discovery get this treatment if it happened on their watch? Doubt it. Disney are the kings of animation and media, so they can do whatever they want in the fans’ eyes.

This Argentinian movie is my most viewed post of all time and it reached thousands of views in 2024 alone. This is pure insanity. Why my review of XXY of all things which I posted in 2019?! I still can’t believe this review got the most traffic ever on Iridium Eye. There are other movies and series that I would’ve liked to have gotten that much traffic, but it was XXY that got this much attention. Are people agreeing what I said when I mentioned my issues with this movie with the things that happened in the story that really turned me off from enjoying this fully? I’m not sure. If people get exposed to my other reviews, then I guess it’s just whatever then.

Those are my most viewed posts of 2024. Any thoughts?

The Colors of the Mountain is property of Film Movement. Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid is property of Discotek. A Class Divided is property of PBS. Sophie Scholl: The Final Days is property of Kino Lorber. The screenshot is from YouTube and property of Kino Lorber. The Wind Will Carry Us is property of Cohen Media Group and eOne. Close-Up is property of The Criterion Collection. Extremis is property of Netflix. The Nun (2013 remake) is property of Film Movement. Mickey Mouse Monopoly is property of MEF. The screenshot is from YouTube and is property of MEF. XXY is property of Film Movement.

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To make sense of present shocks, we need to step back and recognize: we’ve been here before. The first Renaissance, the time of Columbus, Copernicus, Gutenberg and others, likewise redrew all maps of the world, democratized communication and sparked a flourishing of creative achievement. But their world also grappled with the same dark side of rapid change: social division, political extremism, insecurity, pandemics and other unintended consequences of discovery. Now is the second Renaissance.

All our lives are constrained by limited space and time, limits that give rise to a particular set of problems. What should we do, or leave undone, in a day or a lifetime? How much messiness should we accept? What balance of new activities and familiar favorites is the most fulfilling? These may seem like uniquely human quandaries, but they are not: computers, too, face the same constraints, so computer scientists have been grappling with their version of such issues for decades. And the solutions they've found have much to teach us. In a dazzlingly interdisciplinary work, acclaimed author Brian Christian and cognitive scientist Tom Griffiths show how the algorithms used by computers can also untangle very human questions. They explain how to have better hunches and when to leave things to chance, how to deal with overwhelming choices and how best to connect with others.

In just a decade and half Jack Ma, a man from modest beginnings who started out as an English teacher, founded and built Alibaba into one of the world’s largest companies, an e-commerce empire on which hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers depend. Alibaba’s $25 billion IPO in 2014 was the largest global IPO ever. A Rockefeller of his age who is courted by CEOs and Presidents around the world, Jack is an icon for China’s booming private sector and the gatekeeper to hundreds of millions of middle class consumers. Duncan Clark first met Jack in 1999 in the small apartment where Jack founded Alibaba. Granted unprecedented access to a wealth of new material including exclusive interviews, Clark draws on his own experience as an early advisor to Alibaba and two decades in China chronicling the Internet’s impact on the country to create an authoritative, compelling narrative account of Alibaba’s rise. How did Jack overcome his humble origins and early failures to achieve massive success with Alibaba? How did he outsmart rival entrepreneurs from China and Silicon Valley? Can Alibaba maintain its 80% market share? As it forges ahead into finance and entertainment, are there limits to Alibaba’s ambitions? How does the Chinese government view its rise?

In Winner-Take-All Politics, Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson explained how political elites have enabled and propelled plutocracy. Now in American Amnesia, they trace the economic and political history of the United States over the last century and show how a viable mixed economy has long been the dominant engine of America’s prosperity. Like every other prospering democracy, the United States developed a mixed economy that channeled the spirit of capitalism into strong growth and healthy social development. In this bargain, government and business were as much partners as rivals. Public investments in education, science, transportation, and technology laid the foundation for broadly based prosperity. Programs of economic security and progressive taxation provided a floor of protection and business focused on the pursuit of profit-and government addressed needs business could not. The mixed economy was the most important social innovation of the twentieth century. It spread a previously unimaginable level of broad prosperity. It enabled steep increases in education, health, longevity, and economic security. And yet, extraordinarily, it is anathema to many current economic and political elites. And as the advocates of anti-government free market fundamentalist have gained power, they are hell-bent on scrapping the instrument of nearly a century of unprecedented economic and social progress.

Few designers have stayed on top of changing trends the way Tommy Hilfiger has. Fewer still have left such an indelible mark on global culture. Since designing his first collection of "classics with a twist" three decades ago, Tommy Hilfiger has been synonymous with all-American style--but his destiny wasn't always so clear. Growing up one of nine children in a working-class family in Elmira, New York, Tommy suffered from dyslexia, flunked sophomore year of high school, and found himself constantly at odds with his father. Nevertheless, this self-described dreamer had a vision and the relentless will to make it a reality. At eighteen he opened his own clothing store, parlaying his uncanny instinct for style into a budding career as a fashion designer. Through decades of triumph and turmoil, Tommy remained doggedly optimistic. To this day, his approach to commerce is rooted in his positive view of the world. American Dreamer brims with anecdotes that cover Tommy's years as a club kid and scrappy entrepreneur in 1970s New York as well as unique insights into the exclusive A-list personalities with whom he's collaborated and interacted, from Mick Jagger and David Bowie to Ralph Lauren and Calvin Klein. But this is more than just a fashion icon's memoir--it's a road map for building a brand, both professionally and personally. Tommy takes us behind the scenes of every decision--and every mistake--he's ever made, offering advice on leadership, business, team-building, and creativity. This is the story of a true American original, told for the first time in his own words, with honesty, humor, and the insatiable appetite for life and style that proves that sometimes you have to dream big to make it big.

Although it is among the oldest of market institutions, the auction is ubiquitous in today's economy, used for everything from government procurement to selling advertising on the Internet to course assignment at MIT's Sloan School. And yet beyond the small number of economists who specialize in the subject, few people understand how auctions really work. This concise, accessible, and engaging book explains both the theory and the practice of auctions. It describes the main auction formats and pricing rules, develops a simple model to explain bidder behavior, and provides a range of real-world examples. The authors explain what constitutes an auction and how auctions can be modeled as games of asymmetric information -- that is, games in which some players know something that other players do not. Treasury, TaskRabbit, and charities. Readers will begin to understand how economists model auctions and how the rules of the auction shape bidder incentives.

The Internet and smartphone are just the latest in a 250 year long cycle of disruption that has continuously changed the way we live, the way we work and the way we interact. The coming Augmented Age, however, promises a level of disruption, behavioral shifts and changes that are unparalleled. While consumers today are camping outside of an Apple store waiting to be one of the first to score a new Apple Watch or iPhone, the next generation of wearables will be able to predict if we re likely to have a heart attack and recommend a course of action. We watch news of Google s self-driving cars, but don t likely realize this means progressive cities will have to ban human drives in the next decade because us humans are too risky. Following on from the Industrial or Machine Age, the Space Age and the Digital Age, the Augmented Age will be based on four key disruptive themes Artificial Intelligence, Experience Design, Smart Infrastructure, and Health Tech. Historically the previous ages brought significant disruption and changes, but on a net basis jobs were created, wealth was enhanced, and the health and security of society improved. What will the Augmented Age bring? Will robots take our jobs, and AI s subsume us as inferior intelligences, or will this usher in a new age of abundance? Augmented is a book on future history, but more than that, it is a story about how you will live your life in a world that will change more in the next 20 years than it has in the last 250 years. Are you ready to adapt?

Your company is turning in regular profits every year, and its market share is only getting bigger. Competitors can’t touch you. So why is your stock price so sluggish? The answer is as simple as it is cruel: investors aren’t interested in history, and they already know you’re profitable and competitive--that knowledge is baked into your stock price. The hard reality is that a competitive advantage just isn’t enough. Investors want companies to surprise them with unexpected value, which means that you can outperform market expectations only if you as a leader know how to find, create, and deliver a series of multiple competitive advantages. This is why a corporate theory is so important. A good corporate theory provides a compass for those at the strategic helm, guiding their decisions about what assets and activities to pursue, what investments to make, and what strategies to adopt. Behind every long-term corporate success story lies a basic theory about how that company creates value. InBeyond Competitive Advantage, strategy professor Todd Zenger describes what makes a great corporate theory and helps readers understand the many tensions and trade-offs they’ll face as they apply the theory to meet the challenge of market expectations.

Bloodsport is the story of how the mania for corporate deals and mergers all began. The riveting tale of how power lawyers Joe Flom and Marty Lipton, major Wall Street players Felix Rohatyn and Bruce Wasserstein, prominent jurists, and shrewd ideologues in academic garb provided the intellectual firepower, creativity, and energy that drove the corporate elite into a less cozy, Hobbesian world. With total dollar volume in the trillions, the zeal for the deal continues unabated to this day. Underpinning this explosion in mergers and acquisitions--including hostile takeovers--are four questions that radically disrupted corporate ownership in the 1970s, whose force remains undiminished: Are shareholders the sole "owners” of corporations and the legitimate source of power? Should control be exercised by autonomous CEOs or is their assumption of power illegitimate and inefficient? Is the primary purpose of the corporation to generate jobs and create prosperity for the masses and the nation? Or is it simply to maximize the wealth of shareholders? This battle of ideas became the "bloodsport” of American business.

There's little doubt that most humans today are better off than their forebears. Stunningly so, the economist and historian Deirdre McCloskey argues in the concluding volume of her trilogy celebrating the oft-derided virtues of the bourgeoisie. The poorest of humanity, McCloskey shows, will soon be joining the comparative riches of Japan and Sweden and Botswana. Why? Most economists--from Adam Smith and Karl Marx to Thomas Piketty--say the Great Enrichment since 1800 came from accumulated capital. McCloskey disagrees, fiercely. "Our riches," she argues, "were made not by piling brick on brick, bank balance on bank balance, but by ...

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