And fortunately, that wish has been granted with this TV series based on the much-loved Monsters, Inc franchise.

As we all know actor’s voices are sometimes substituted by a lesser star when films are converted to TV, but this isn’t the case with this glossily-produced series, with the main ‘monster’ voice talent all returning – primarily Billy Crystal’s Mike Wazowski and John Goodman’s James P ‘Sulley’ Sullivan.

The first two episodes – Welcome to Monsters, Inc and Meet Mift – plays it a lot ‘safer’ than the regular ingenuity of a Pixar film, but it’s perfectly serviceable for the targeted Disney Plus audience – which is basically an introduction of Ben Feldman’s (Cloverfield) talented ‘scarer’ and mechanic Tylor Tuskmon as the primary feature.

These set the scene directly following the events of 2001’s movie after Waternoose’s arrest, with Mike and Sulley being put in charge with fuelling the city of Monstropolis with ‘laughter’ replacing the ‘scaring’ – which young Tylor was initially hired for.

Sadly, the animation quality is a touch below Pixar’s, with Disney’s own television animation studios taking the reins – but it’s still a cut above the competition despite that.

Even though it does go ‘through the motions’ a tad in the first two episodes, this definitely has the scope to roar during its ten-episode run – as Mike continues to work the room by garnering the most laughs.

He’s still without doubt the franchise’s MVP.

ESP Rating: 3/5

Gavin Miller

 Monsters At Work (U)

Episode One: Welcome To Monsters, Inc

Episode Two: Meet Mift

Platform: Disney+

Voice Cast: Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Ben Feldman, Mindy Kaling, Bonnie Hunt & Henry Winkler

Running Times: 26 Mins & 24 Mins

Directors: Kaitlyn Ritter & Shane Zalvin

The challenge is produced by The Reading Agency in partnership with libraries and this year’s Wild World Heroes theme is supported by the WWF (World Wildlife Fund).

The initiative encourages children aged 4 to 11 through reading to see how they can make a difference to the environment and animals that live in our communities.

Children who complete a book review at any of the city’s libraries will qualify for free admission with their family of up to six people to watch Jungle Book, Peter Rabbit 2 or The Witches in August.

The activity is free to take part and the challenge has now begun to read six books over the school summer holiday.

Children collect a Wild World Heroes sticker for each book they read and add it to a special collector’s poster, which when complete, will earn them a certificate as well as a chance to watch a film for free at the Key Theatre.

Jag Singh, general manager at the Key Theatre, said: “The Summer Reading Challenge is an excellent programme that encourages children to read, especially during the school holidays. Wild World Heroes features amazing books and awesome rewards for children that sign up to the challenge.

“This year we’ve teamed up with our city libraries to offer an added incentive for children who’ve completed their book reviews by rewarding them with an opportunity to watch a film free of charge with their family.

 “It’s the perfect way to continue to develop literacy in our children and we’re looking forward to welcoming them at the Key Theatre, which of course gives parents an added activity to keep their children occupied this summer.”

For more information about the Summer Reading Challenge, search online for Peterborough libraries or telephone Peterborough Central Library on: 01733 864280.

Details of how to secure a film showing can be obtained by telephoning the Key Theatre box office on: 01733 207239 or emailing keytheatre@cityculturepeterborough.org.uk

The building is hosting One Small Step, a giant representation of the lunar surface created by the renowned artist and sculptor Peter Walker. The 36m x 7m artwork uses imagery from NASA to show all the craters and details of the lunar rock. It will transform a huge area of the floor in the Cathedral’s north and south transepts into an image of the moon’s terrain for visitors to walk on.

The exhibition will be on display at the Cathedral until October 31 and during this time lunar-themed events are planned. From August 2 – 7 One Giant Leap will offer children a fun ‘astronaut training’ session, including a teddy bear parachute jump.

On selected dates there will also be Moon with a View, an opportunity to see the artwork from above and then climb right up to see the view from the top of the Cathedral tower.

On July 24 mezzo soprano Gabriella Pineda-Rodrigues will give a concert of Songs to the Moon, accompanied by the pianist Kate Wishart, and on August 11 the Cambridge Science Centre will be visiting with their show, Safe in Space. 

A silent disco with Dancing on the Moon will take place on  July 31 and a special series of services entitled Space for God will take place on Sunday evenings.

During the October Half Term the National Space Centre in Leicester will bring their Inflatable Planetarium to give a tour of the sky at night, and there’ll also be a chance for families to get together and Meet you at the Moon when the cover band Shakeout entertains. Full details of all the events are on the Cathedral website.

Canon Tim Alban Jones, Vice Dean of Peterborough, said: “As we slowly emerge from the restrictions of the global pandemic it’s truly wonderful to have the opportunity to see things from such a different perspective. I hope that this close-up glimpse of somewhere that is normally hundreds of thousands of miles away will help visitors have a sense of the vastness of God’s universe and to think about our place within it.”

The artist, Peter Walker, said: “This is an artwork designed to let us think about exploration, about possibilities and about how that one small step we might take in our own lives could bring us closer to our own understanding of the vastness and otherness of existence.

“It is an artwork designed for those who wish to examine closely the surface of the moon which we have all looked up and considered, but it is also designed as a playful space for family adventure. More than anything this is a fantastic opportunity to tell everyone that you have been somewhere quite different this summer and take a selfie on the moon.”

Entry to the Cathedral and the exhibition is by donation. The opening hours for One Small Step are usually 10am to 4pm Monday to Saturday, and 12 noon until 3pm on Sundays. On Thursdays during the school holidays the exhibition will also be open from 6.30pm until 8.30pm. Times may vary and it is advisable to check the website before visiting.

Visitors are asked to ensure that they wear flat heeled shoes to walk on the moon surface. More information is at www.peterborough-cathedral.org.uk/onesmallstep.

The exhibition is being supported by sponsors Henson Crisp Ltd, Independent Financial Advisers  and Speed Agency.

Just like with Fast & Furious 9, Black Widow – while admittedly a more intelligent film than anything in The Fast Saga – feels more like a competent mish-mash of all that has come before it, more than anything revolutionary.

If this had come out six or seven years ago it would have felt a little more refreshing, but even the origin story to Black Widow’s past is pretty standard – even though it is gratifying to see Scarlett Johansson’s assassin-turned-superhero Natasha Romanoff finally on the big screen.

We all know that unfortunately the now-deceased Romanoff gave her life to save the planet during the events of Avengers: Endgame, with this movie being set in between 2016’s Captain America: Civil War and 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War – with flashbacks to her childhood thrown in for the usual storyline set-up.

Said flashbacks are based around her childhood growing up in Ohio, with Dad Alexei (Stranger Things’ David Harbour) – who turns out to be the Soviet super soldier equivalent of Captain America known as the ‘Red Guardian’ – Mum Melina (Oscar winner Rachel Weiss) and little Sis Yelena (Fighting with My Family starlet Florence Pugh).

But all is not what it seems when they have to escape to Cuba with SHIELD closing in on sensitive information that her parents possess – linked with villainous Russian Dreykov (Ray Winstone) – and their idyllic life in the States quickly evaporates, as the ‘family’ life they knew sadly falls apart.

Alexei goes back to active duty, Melina disappears after being badly injured, and the two girls end up being trained in Dreykov’s ‘Red Room’ – an elite program where young women are primed to become ‘Black Widow’ elite assassins.

Fast forward twenty or so years, and Romanoff is on the run from William Hurt’s Thaddeus Ross and co after the events of Civil War – but when the sister she hasn’t seen in years sends her a mysterious package she is forced to confront a dangerous conspiracy.

That is that Dreykov – who Romanoff thought she’d killed prior to joining SHIELD – has a new mind-controlling serum that makes all his highly-trained hitwomen partake in deadly missions across the world at his behest.

To make matters worse, he has also developed a mysterious technological being – known in comic lore as Taskmaster (Oblivion’s Olga Kurylenko) – who can mimic the physical movements of anyone it witnesses in combat.

This leads to an accomplished – if a little paint-by-numbers – story finale that owes more than a few nods to arguably the best of the Marvel standalone films, Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

But while this probably won’t ultimately end up in most people’s Top Ten MCU films – it’s great to see Johansson finally getting the ‘props’ her fan favourite character deserves.

Even if it’s more satisfyingly solid, than spectacular.

ESP Rating: 3.5/5

Gavin Miller

Showcase Cinema De Lux Peterborough, Out Now

Cast: Scarlett Johansson, Florence Pugh, David Harbour, Rachel Weisz, Ray Winstone, O-T Fagbenle, Olga Kurylenko, William Hurt & Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Running Time: 2 Hrs 14 Mins

Director: Cate Shortland

GO TO www.showcasecinemas.co.uk FOR ALL THE LATEST FILM INFORMATION & SHOWTIMES AT PETERBOROUGH’S SHOWCASE CINEMA DE LUX

While it doesn’t reinvent the wheel, this $200m big-budget blockbuster – acquired exclusively by Amazon Prime after being in cinematic stasis due to Covid – proves to be serviceable fare.

When time travellers come back thirty years from the future – during the World Cup Final in Qatar at the end of 2022 to be exact (sadly no England in the final) – they reveal that mankind is losing a war against an invading alien species.

These (rather impressive looking) creatures – called the ‘Whitespikes’ due to them having the ability to fire sharp objects from their tentacles – arrived in 2048, and now in 2051 have all but wiped out the human populace by hunting in packs (and eating people dead or alive) to cause an extinction level event.

And to make things even worse, when the world’s militaries have been sent into the future via a ‘Jumplink’ to do a seven-day deployment detail – less than thirty per cent return.

So an international draft is opened which leads to Pratt’s family man Dan Forester – a former Iraq War green beret-turned-biology teacher – being one of hundreds of civilians now having to answer the call.

Along the way he teams up with his kick-ass ‘adult’ daughter Colonel Muri Forester (Yvonne Strahovski), cancer-stricken draftee Dorian (Edwin Hodge), the movie’s comedic relief in Charlie (Sam Richardson) – and even his estranged father James (Oscar winner JK Simmons) – as the unit looks for ways to potentially take out this alien race.

What this leads to is a kind of Battle: Los Angeles crossed with Edge of Tomorrow hybrid – that is generally enjoyable throughout due to its glossy production budget.

You’ll have probably forgotten about it by tomorrow – but it provides two hours of competently brainless fun for today.

Rating: 3/5 

Gavin Miller

Platform: Amazon Prime Video

Cast: Chris Pratt, Yvonne Strahovski, Sam Richardson, JK Simmons, Edwin Hodge, Betty Gilpin, Jasmine Mathews, Keith Powers, Ryan Kiera Armstrong & Mary Lynn Rajskub

Running Time: 2 Hrs 18 Mins

Director: Chris Mckay

The producers of ‘Horizons: A 2021 Space Odyssey’, made the decision due to ongoing uncertainty over Covid restrictions.

Professor Cox will now appear at East of England Arena and Events Centre on September 29, 2022, and his tour has been re-named Horizons: A 21st Century Space Odyssey.

Jason Lunn, venue director, East of England Arena and Event Centre, said, “This is disappointing but understandable news, given the complexity and size of the tour.

“I know that many people will have been looking forward to seeing this incredible show at the Arena, and I hope they will all be able to attend the rescheduled event on September 29, 2022.

“Tickets for the original show date will be valid for this event, and we are assured that any ticket holders unable to attend this new date will be eligible for a refund.”

A team of dedicated and enthusiastic volunteers will be on hand to show visitors around the Tower at weekends, bringing the remarkable medieval wall paintings to life.

Longthorpe Tower will be opening its doors to the public again on Saturday July 10, after day to day management changes hands to Nene Park Trust.

Longthorpe Tower continues to be cared for by English Heritage, but the day to day management of visits to Longthorpe Tower has changed hands from Vivacity to Nene Park Trust, ensuring access to this important historical site for Peterborough remains open for all.

Hannah Keeley, Project Development Officer (Communities) at Nene Park Trust said, “We are delighted to take on responsibility for Longthorpe Tower and are excited to be opening this fantastic building to the public again with the support of dedicated and passionate volunteers. The property is unique and an amazing insight into the history of medieval Peterborough and we can’t wait for our first visitors.” 

If you fancy taking a look you can book online for a 1-hour visit to the Tower on a Saturday or a Sunday 10am-4.30pm throughout the summer and until the end of October. Please visit the Nene Park website to find out more www.nenepark.org.uk/longthorpe-tower

Following an 18-month development phase, Nene Park Trust has received confirmation that the National Lottery Heritage Fund has approved a grant of £1.965 million towards the 5-year delivery phase of Nene Park: Your Community Greenspace, a £3 million project which will bring improvements to Nene Park infrastructure and deliver a range of community events and opportunities for Peterborough and the region.

Matthew Bradbury, Nene Park Trust Chief Executive said, “We have a strong track record of providing a Park that is much loved by our community; but we want to take steps to ensure Nene Park is as inclusive as possible for all of Peterborough’s residents. This grant will allow us to implement a transformative and impactful project for the Trust and Nene Park. We are extremely grateful for this fantastic show of support for our work from The National Lottery Heritage Fund.”

Made possible by funds raised by players of the National Lottery, Your Community Greenspace is an ambitious and exciting project with three key themes:

• Empowering and engaging our communities to help conserve the natural heritage of Nene Park.
• Building bridges with the multi-cultural communities of Peterborough to make Ferry Meadows an inclusive community hub.
• Improving physical and mental health and wellbeing through nurturing connections with nature and the outdoors.

Nene Park Trust is looking forward to delivering a range of exciting plans for the Park and for Peterborough over the next few years and will be recruiting additional staff to expand the team. This project will be far reaching; improving and transforming Nene Park to meet the needs of the many communities of the city and helping improve physical and mental health and wellbeing for all as we recover from Covid-19.

Throughout the development stage of the project, the Trust has been working with community groups and carrying out outreach across the city to find out how regularly groups access greenspace and what could be further provided to encourage under-represented and under-served groups access greenspace more regularly.

Now that the Trust has secured this funding they can begin to make some of the wider project plans a reality. This will include developing the activities and events programme, strengthening the volunteering offer at Nene Park, replacing Pontoon Bridge and refreshing the welcome area and toilets, improving transport opportunities and much more.

I must admit, there are worse ways to spend your time than sitting in the Charters beer garden on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Good beer flowing, some great food being served up and some excellent live music, it’s undoubtedly one of my ‘happy places’ and somewhere I deeply missed during the pandemic.

I recently had my first opportunity to spend such a Sunday back down by the river and caught the very talented Matt Howard performing a solo acoustic set to a Charters beer garden that was once again filled with life and joviality – a truly terrific sight to see after the year that we’ve all endured.

Matt’s repertoire was varied and lengthy – I clocked his first set at well over an hour and twenty minutes! The second half was no shorter, plus two encores either side of a quick dash to the loo, it’s impressive the amount of good quality tracks that Matt is able to perform.

everything from Ed Sheeran and Elton John to Sam Fender and Jake Bugg, mixed in with a few wild cards and requests from the audience thrown in for good measure, Matt caries them all well with accomplished guitar playing and a strong vocal ability.

He certainly has a catalogue of music built for entertaining the masses, which is exactly what he did, rounding off a fine afternoon with some staple sing along classics by Oasis and Neil Diamond that had all in attendance joining in.

Charters itself is undergoing an impressive redevelopment with their beer garden increasing in size this summer. As a musician who also enjoys regularly performing at the venue it excites me to see the work so far and imagine what it will be like once completed.

A raised stage area with a large sail covered roof in the far corner of the garden facing the river will create a theatrical center for all live performances. Along with a reshuffling of the current structures, the addition of a new outdoor bar offering cellar beers and increased food options plus even more seating will allow for some truly fantastic events to take place in a setting unlike any other in Peterborough. Full steam ahead for live music at Charters.

You can find out more about Matt Howard via his Facebook page, likewise with Charters Bar Peterborough or visit www.Charters-Bar.com.

Next up for Sunday Session tunes it’s The Nuggets on July 25 – keep an eye on the ESP Gig Guide for more.

Rob Bull

Even though the storyline was more ludicrous – quite literally as Chris ‘Ludacris’ Bridges’ Tej And Tyrese Gibson’s Roman end up in space (yep you heard that right) – it generally just seemed like a mish-mash of every race/action scene from the franchise. But arguably not quite as exhilarating with a distinct feeling of ‘seen it all before’ – four years since Vin Diesel’s Dom and the crew hit the big screen.

One thing this supposed start of a trilogy storyline arc does is try and change it up, by introducing a Dom Toretto back story. The movie starts with Mr Nobody’s (Kurt Russell in a brief cameo) plane being brought down with Charlize Theron’s villainous Cipher – who was left defeated but escaped at the end of Fast 8 – being captured as the prized cargo, with Dom’s jealous younger brother Jakob (former WWE wrestler turned actor John Cena) as the mastermind behind it.

Through multiple flashbacks – with a young Dom (Vinnie Bennett) and Jakob (Finn Cole) – the start of a sibling rivalry is revealed with Jakob’s apparent compliance in the death of their father Jack (JD Pardo), which plays the main ‘meat’ of the storyline.

This serviceable main plotline is aided by such secondary side dishes as the return of Sung Kang’s Han, Jordana Brewster’s Mia and Tokyo Drift’s Sean Boswell (Lucas Black) – which adds to the fan service – even if the film opens with the ultra-formulaic plot device of Dom and Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), with Dom’s son Brian, living an idyllic life in the middle of nowhere with no intentions of returning back to their old life. Which of course quickly unravelled to be nonsense. Can’t they think of another way to start a film?

That said, the Dom/Jakob plot line – with Cipher menacingly in the background – proves to be adequate, and this ends up doing exactly what it says on the tin – even with a little bit of staleness creeping in.

Sadly it did miss Fast Five’s breakout character, with The Rock’s Hobbs – and more importantly the presence of the late Paul Walker.

His dynamic with Diesel was the heartbeat of the franchise, but even though it has dropped back through the gears a bit since instalments 5, 6 and 7 – this still proved to be a welcome return for the big-budget summer popcorn-cruncher after the recent pandemic lockdown.

It’s just more furious, than fast nowadays…

ESP Rating: 3/5 

Gavin Miller

Cast: Vin Diesel, John Cena, Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris ‘Ludacris’ Bridges, Sung Kang, Charlize Theron, Nathalie Emmanuel, Anna Sawai, Lucas Black, Shad Moss, Thue Ersted Rasmussen, Shea Whigham, Vinnie Bennett, Finn Cole, Michael Rooker, Jd Pardo, Helen Mirren & Kurt Russell

Running Time: 2 Hrs 25 Mins

Director: Justin Lin

Go to www.showcasecinemas.co.uk for all the latest film information & showtimes at Peterborough’s Showcase Cinema De Lux