So, as planned, Claire and I went to the cinema to watch The Lion King.

The experience was a great advert for movie piracy. Not because the film was poor – far from it (more on that later). The problem was our fellow cinema-goers.

The issue with the other Lion King fans, was that they had an average age of about 3 years old. This predictably resulted in long queues of children, waiting to buy Pick N Mix – gram for gram, the most expensive consumable known to man. Seriously, I am sure crack cocaine carries a cheaper street value!

As well as the overpriced sweets, the kids also bought fizzy drinks, ice cream and popcorn. It would have been easier for all those involved, for a doctor to give each child a pill containing the addictives E534640, E134 and WTF209.

Swallowing the pill would have resulted in the devil-possessed bairns becoming equally as crazy as having consumed the sweets, but without causing endless queues for the rest of us.

Popping the ePill would be a bonus for the parents too, given how it wouldn’t cause their precious cherubs to vomit sugary additives all over the car upholstery on the journey home – something that cannot be guaranteed with the consumption of Ice Blast, Fizzy Fish and Crazy Frog ice cream.

It was all too stressful. I just wanted to relax and sit in a dark room for a couple of hours. Ironically, given how I was in a cinema complex, that is exactly where I was going. It was just a shame how I would be joined by dozens of Regan MacNeil clones.

Our final act before heading into the screen, was to pick up some snacks and drinks. We were not the only ones with the same idea. The queue was so long, that NASA were reporting to have spotted it from space.

Upon reaching the front of the queue, I ordered on behalf of Claire and me. A bit of a mistake. The cinema lobby, where we had been waiting was louder than a nightclub on a Saturday night (not that I would know). Plus, I was sat in the wheelchair (any excuse to park in the disabled bay), so a good couple of feet below the counter.

The man behind the till clearly couldn’t hear my shouts of “A KIT KAT AVALANCHE!”. The embarrassing thing about having to repeatedly repeat myself, was that I was convinced that everyone else in the lobby could hear me and were thinking to themselves “That man must really want his ice cream. I hope he hasn’t got a gun – he sounds crazy”

The frustrating thing was that the Avalanche wasn’t even for me – Claire wanted it. Even when my wife did intervene, the man claimed to have never heard of a Kit Kat Avalanche. This is despite huge advertising boards promoting the Kit Kat Avalanche and a large machine, located directed behind him – a machine used for making a Kit Kat Avalanche. Sigh.

I like to believe that there is a quote from Basil Fawlty, to deal with most situations in life. The world’s most useless ice cream vendor, could quite fairly be described in the same way as Mrs Richards – “Deaf, mad and blind”.

Fast forward a good half hour, to find Claire and me in our allocated seats. There is an advantage to taking the wheelchair to the cinema – nobody sat in the same area as the two of us.

We had fantastic seating, plus the Children of the Damned were all sat behind us. I don’t normally rave about how great a movie looks and sounds at the cinema, but I must commend Vue on their excessively loud speakers and fantastic surround sound – it totally blocked out any screams, shouts, farts and cries from behind us.

The film was due to start at 12noon. It started at 12.30pm. This is owing to the fact that we were forced to watch adverts we had all seen on television already, plus the usual selection of trailers for upcoming films.

Imagine if this happened at a train station. The 14:20 Virgin Cross Country pulls into the station. However, nobody can board it until they watch 40 minutes of adverts for Virgin Media, Virgin Wine, Virgin Atlantic, Virgin Girls and Virgin Records. Wouldn’t that just be absurd? It would also be a bloody miracle that the 14:20 actually arrived at 14:20!

There is, of course, a solution. Just turn up 30 minutes late for the movie. Although, you just know by doing that, it’ll be the one time that the film starts when it should have, and you arrive, only to find Simba sobbing over his dead father. You creep in past snotty five-year-olds, off their face on Tangfastics, while their mothers, tutt at your tardiness and how you’re ruining the film for everyone else. Oh, the hypocrisy!

At least some of the trailers looked like films I might actually want to pirate – and if the Internet Police happen to be reading my blog, that is what we call a “joke”.

Claire really wants to see Cats. I must admit, I thought it looked good too, despite it starring James Corden – he seems to be in absolutely everything these days. I rather like musicals. In 1997, while all my classmates were playing air guitar to Wonderwall, I was in my bedroom, dancing and singing to my Evita soundtrack. I still remember the lyrics today, but don’t ask me to jump around like Antonio Banderas.

When it wasn’t Evita, it would be Spice Girls or The Smurfs Go Pop… I know – sometimes even I ask myself how I ended up marrying a woman.

The film I liked the look of was Horrible Histories: Rotten Romans. It’s one of those movies featuring every British comedian you can think of – apart from Jim Davidson (I hope) – either as a major role or a tiny cameo.

Horrible Histories has the potential to be, well, shit. 15 years on, I am still yet to recover from the disappointment and trauma of Churchill: The Hollywood Years.

Now for the bit you’ve all been waiting for. The reason you have read and tolerated all this spiel. My movie review for The Lion King 2019…

There isn’t one.

I don’t do film reviews. In the past, I have found writing them incredibly boring. This blog is kind of a diary for me, with posts about things I’ve done. I never intended to make a movie website, although had I done so, IMDB.com would have closed down years ago. Plus, I don’t think I am that good at writing them.

It’s a bit like putting together a match report of a football game. I would joyfully write page upon page about a dog invading the pitch, but a serious in-depth article on player analysis, tactics and shit? I never pay attention to that stuff when it comes on the telly! You have to remember, as a Leeds and Bath City fan, tactics and shit are pointless to me.

Back to The Lion King. No review. I’m not even going to write much about it, as if I was to put something on this blog, chances are it’s been done a gazillion times before on another.

What’s that? You still want me to put something? Awww, you twisted my arm…

• Why do all the animals of Africa celebrate the birth of Simba, despite knowing all too well that he will kill and eat them? It’s like users of Air B&B rejoicing at Rose West being released from prison and is renting out her box room.
• Who is Nala’s daddy? In the wild, the male lion fathers all cubs, killing any that don’t belong to him. Just putting that one out there.
• The film is set in Africa. Therefore, why do the majority of the cast have American or English accents? Imagine the meltdown from Daily Mail readers if the role of Simba was given to a talented child actor from Nigeria!
• Thank you to whoever at Walt Disney Towers made the decision to axe this…

Finally – a totally random coincidence. I have been off work unwell today. Don’t worry, I don’t plan on blogging from hospital again anytime soon.

Today’s absence did not require the use of a surgeon’s scaple. A day in bed and some spells on my throne – aka the lavatory – have been all that I required.

Why is this a coincidence? Well, after watching the original Lion King in 1994, I missed the next day of school with a stomach upset. Although, I think I know why I became poorly 25 years ago…