The reviewers reviewed: the weekly round-up of critical reaction to this week's major arts events

Britpop has been revived 10 years after it first emerged. Only one of its progenitors, Blur, has remained interesting - unlike rivals Oasis.

Frontman Damon Albarn has steered

his troops down

a succession of

unlikely routes, all

of which have

turned out to be

paved with gold.

Leaves the compe-tition floundering in

its wake.

Times

Think Tank provokes adjectives you are never likely to hear used about Oasis: experimental, intriguing, dignified.

Guardian

Coxon's departure means the end of

one of music's

most fertile creative partnerships. The

band has taken a

risk but failed to raise its game.

Scotsman

HERALD VERDICT

This limp, soggy-

brained record is

merely for that

most unlikely of

tragic creatures:

a Blur completist.

Critical thermometer: HOT & COLD

FILM

X-Men 2

X-Men 2 sets a new standard in blockbuster sequels.

The three words that sum up this film are: more is more. In this, the first blockbuster of 2003 that really lives up to its hype, it's like coming home with extra change.

Telegraph

Marks an evolutionary leap forward from the overrated original. Smart, superior popular entertainment.

The List

The mutants appear bland at best, spoilt rotten at worst. Compromised and piecemeal, Singer's film seems almost solely designed to

help Fox win the battle with Warners, whose Matrix sequels are

now due.

Independent

HERALD VERDICT

X2 isn't disastrous. It's just that after a tight, intelligent first instalment, part two looks messy. Then there's Alan Cumming's severely misjudged turn as Nightcrawler.

Critical thermometer: mixed

BOOK

Oryx and Crake

Margaret Atwood's first novel since the Booker Prize-winning The Blind Assassin offers a future even more grim than that of her sci-fi yarn of a different dystopia, The Handmaid's Tale.

Atwood's great talent for narrative has never been displayed to better effect.

Toronto Star

Most dystopias are really satirical versions of contemporary society, and not

ideas of the future

at all. This is a powerful and impressive fable, more fantastic and

less imminent than

The Handmaid's Tale

- but much less optimistic.

Spectator

HERALD VERDICT

There are occasional flashes of Atwood's sharp wit in this suffocatingly dark novel, but, these apart, it offers no morsel of amusement. Yet it lacks the narrative suspense needed wholly to capture the interest as fiction rather than as a clever exposition of science run amok.

Critical thermometer: warm