A Descent into Dullness

13 July 2017 @ 05:25 am

Tom Holland is pretty great as Parker/Spider-Man, espcially the 15-year old rookie part of it. Michael Keaton's Vulture falls into the mid-range of Marvel villains, right on the edge of the top tier, as he has actual motivations and some personality beyond I Am The Bad Guy. Among the character cameos is a very stealth set-up for Miles Morales using Donald Glover. Oh and Jacob Batalon's sidekick/best friend Ned was pretty good.

Tags: marvel, movies, spider-man, super-heroes

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04 July 2017 @ 01:09 am

Streaming Watch 6/26-7/3/17

Haven s.2: Several new long-term cast additions. Notably Jason Priestly as Son of Mayor Charm and Adam "Edge" Copeland as Dwight the Cleaner. Plus lots of Mythology mixed in with all the Monster-of-the-Week. Especially for Duke's family history and the coy secret back-story of Dave & Vince. Though going from the season finale to some kind of Christmas special is kind of weird. They should probably have moved those around in the schedule.

Moana: Rewatch, still gorgeous with great songs and perfect line-readings from Dwayne Johnson as Maui.

Tags: animation, disney, movies, stephen king, television

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29 June 2017 @ 02:03 pm

Baby Driver

Mom didn't think this movie qualifies as a musical. Me, I say the way every sequence, big or small, is perfectly choreagraphed to the soundtrack makes it a musical. And that soundtrack is pretty amazing.

Also its a really good crime (reluctant crook subgenre) movie. The love interest could maybe have used a little more depth but Lily James is still pretty good with what she has to work with. Ansel Elgort is a delight. And the high-end talent make for a great supporting cast of quirky crooks.

Tags: crime, driving, movies, music

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12 June 2017 @ 11:23 pm

Streaming Watch 6/5-6/12/17

Dr. Strange: Rewatch
He Never Died: Sort-of vampire story with Henry Rollins. Rollins does disconnected ancient immortal very well.

Wynonna Earp s.1: I'm all about the snarky lady demon-killers with sidekicks and bad boy love interests.

Tags: movies, television

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08 June 2017 @ 02:47 pm

Wonder Woman

Easily clears the low bar of being the best of the DC-Cinematic universe films. And beyond that is a good film all on its own. Gal Gadot shows a good deal more range and talent than I had been expecting. The Paradise Island sequences are excellent, as are the Diana & Steve Go On a Quest. Plus Pine & Gadot have some excellent chemistry, that makes the somewhat rushed romance feel believable. Some of the mythological back-story is a bit of a mess, including the climatic Final Battle. But a solid, entertaining and enjoyable movie. If nothing else, gives some hope that the upcoming Justice League and Aquaman will also be worth seeing.

Tags: comics, dc, movies, super-heroes

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05 June 2017 @ 11:18 pm

Streaming Watch 5/29-6/5

Riverdale s.1
Jane the Virgin s.3
It always seems easier to binge from a device at work than my home tv. Especially for those last 4 or 5 episodes of a season that sit on my dvr. Love the way seasons for CW shows get uploaded so quickly to Netflix.

Mystery Science Theater 3000. Caught up with the final two Netflix episodes, "the Christmas that Almost Wasn't" (so nauseously twee) and "At the Earth's Core" (more Doug McClure vs. ERB adaptation). Between the latter and "the Land that Time Forgot" I kind of wish there had been a John Carter of Mars movie in the 60s with McClure.

Tags: movies, television

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15 May 2017 @ 11:24 pm

Streaming Watch 5/9-5/15

MST3K: Wizards of the Lost Kingdom
MST3K: Wizards of the Lost Kingdom II : So David Carradine, as the heroic the Dark One, and his exotic dancer wife and the comedic incompetance of the "heroic" wizard leads actually elevate this to Hawk the Slayer levels of terrible.

Master of None, s.2 : I know not everyone likes them, but some of my favorite bits involve show runners Aziz Ansari and Alan Yang's parents. Sure they can't act and thus give very stiff line readings, but that adds to their charm for me. And while I didn't hate Francesca, her latter story lines definitely felt the weakest. Hopeful that Ansari and Yang do a 3rd season.

Tags: movies, mst3k, television

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11 May 2017 @ 06:04 am

the Guardians of the Galaxy vol.2

GotG 2 follows the normal sequel rule of "what you did the first time, but more", but happily is one of the rare occasions where that works. Its helped in this immensely by the sheer charm of Kurt Russel as Star-Lord's long missing father. Plus lots of character growth side-stories for most of the cast. And just how crazy adorable Baby Groot is.

Lots of easter eggs and cameos, with the stand-out probably being Stallone, Ving Rhames and others as Ravager captains/original GotG members. Though really Mr. Gunn, FIVE post-script scenes? I left after the Adam Warlock one so missed the teen Groot and SECOND Stan Lee cameo.

Tags: comics, marvel, movies, scifi

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24 April 2017 @ 11:35 pm

Streaming Watch 4/17-4/24

Mostly more of the MST3K relaunch.

MST3K: the Time Travellers
MST3K: Avalanche: Avaaaaaaaaaalanche
MST3K: the Beast of Hollow Mountain: Dullest cowboy vs. dinosaur movie ever.
MST3K: Starcrash
Chewing Gum: British comedy, so only 6-episode season. 20-something poor black woman and sex, drugs and family.
MST3K: the Land That Time Forgot: Before we even get to the dinosaurs (which of the three dino-themed movies so far, actually look the best) we have a U-Boat torpedo a ship. The survivors of that ship (including the token American hero and lady love interest/biologist) then capture the U-boat. Then the Germans take it back. Then by the time we get to the lost continent the Allied side is back in charge with no explanation.

Tags: comedy, dinosaurs, movies, mst3k, scifi

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17 April 2017 @ 06:58 pm

Streaming Watch 4/10-4/17

Documentary Now: S2. I generally haven't seen the original docs they're parodying, but there send up of "The Kid Stays in the Picture" is just fucking perfect in every way.
Pacific Heat: This was a poor choice. Like Archer if it wasn't funny and was poorly drawn and was Australian and just suuuuuuuuucked.
Captain Fantastic: If I could be anyone as a quasi-cultish off-the-grid dad attempting to raise a little army of "ideal" people its Viggo Mortensen. Also that attempting to raise a family totally off-the-grid is just not the best idea.
MST3K: S11 - "Reptilicus" & "Cry Wilderness". Only two episodes in, but so far I think the jokes were a little bit better for the 2nd (though the fx in the first really is just laughably bad).

Tags: animation, comedy, movies, mst3k, television

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23 March 2017 @ 01:42 pm

Beauty & the Beast

An ok remake. Not as good as Maleficent or the Jungle Book. But ok. Emma Watson is a good actor and a passable singer and Dan Stevens isa good singer and passabel actor. Luke Evans is enjoyably hammy and dickish as Gaston and Josh Gad is more amusing than terrible. And the FX work for Beast and the living castle was pretty good.

Tags: disney, movies, musicals

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15 March 2017 @ 10:37 pm

Logan

While obviously not the actual finale to the X-Men movie franchise, an excellent cap to the original set of characters and their actors. Jackman and Stewart bring a lot to their last outings as Wolverine and Proffesor X. Stewart especially brings to mind his previous role as an super-spy suffering from Alzheimer's in Safe House (and yeesh, that was all the way back in '98). And even if she doesn't return in a future X-property I hope Dafne Keen gets to expand on the promise she shows her as Laura/X-23.

Tags: marvel, movies, wolverine, x-men

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01 March 2017 @ 09:59 pm

The Great Wall

As far as Man Vs. CGI Monsters goes, an entertaining movie. Slight on actual plot or character. But in the upper third of movies where people fight evil monsters. Say not at the level of Aliens or Pacific Rim, but ahead of Starship Troopers or World War Z. Plus you get Matt Damon doing, what I've been told, is an Irish accent.

Tags: fantasy, monsters, movies

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16 February 2017 @ 04:16 pm

John Wick 2

First off, no dogs were murdered this time around. And while various Russian goons get killed in the opening bit (where John goes to get his car back) the vast majority of dead goons this time around are Camorra. Who are part of some kind of High Table of Crime I guess? Anyway John wants to re-retire after the first movies blood letting (after getting back his car) but he can't because reasons. Murdery reasons. In addition to all the shooting, punching and stabbing we get more Secret World of Crime world building with more on the Continental Hotels for Assassins and their support businesses. Also Laurence Fishburne as the Beggar King of New York. Fun enough killspree action movie. And again no dead puppies this time around.

Tags: action, guns, movies

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18 January 2017 @ 10:00 pm

A Monster Calls

I'm not crying, you're the one crying.

Visually arresting, especially the Story sequences. Sigourney Weaver faking an English accent was a bit..odd. But sad movie.

Tags: death, movies

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11 January 2017 @ 09:29 pm

Hidden Figures

This was not a subtle movie in delivering its message. But then looking at our current political situation maybe subtle isn't the way to go. Anyway good movie with a lot of top rate acting talent involved. Though I'll admit John Glenn just dying last month meant that the final act crisis involving his first rentry from orbit wasn't quite as tense as the script probably intended.

Tags: movies, science, space, space travel

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05 January 2017 @ 04:53 pm

Star Wars: Rogue One

Episode III & i/2 (how do fractionals work in Roman numbering anyway) was pretty darn good. Sure the characters probably could have used a smidge more depth (beyond Director Krennick at least). But the various character call-backs to the rest of the franchise work well (well outside from the confusing addition of Dr. Death and his sidekick and the pointless very brief sequence with R2D2 & C-3PO). But yes, this was some very nice Star Wars-ing.

Tags: movies, scifi, star wars

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30 December 2016 @ 08:09 am

2016: The Movie (Trailer)

Tags: comedy, horror, movies, this fucking year

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22 December 2016 @ 05:11 am

Passengers

I already knew J-Law was amazing at delivering traumatized and emotionally devasted. But Pratt does pretty well at the I Have The Space Madness thus leading to making a Super-Selfish Choice. Anyway, good acting all around. The plotting a bit less. I mean it has a Plot Roadblock that prevents the characters from doing certain things and then said Roadblock is Deus Ex'd away so that the characters can deal with the threat to the ship.

Tags: movies, scifi

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16 December 2016 @ 05:25 pm

Moana

The musical bits were very catchy and enjoyable. And Auli'i Cravalho voices a charming and delightful lead. Plus Dwayne Johnson oozes charisma even when being a giant butthead. Also I liked the swerve for the final boss confrontation. Of course now I want a Maui/Lilo & Stitch fight kaiju movie. With musical numbers.

Tags: animation, disney, movies, musicals

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08 December 2016 @ 01:00 pm

Allied

Brad Pitt seems to be finding a bit of a new niche as a WW-II guy. Here as a Canadian pilot-turned British spy-pretending at start to be French. Cotillard is pretty good throughout, but I kind of would like to see the story told entirely from her perspective. As it is she really only gets to do some heavy acting right at the end. I also would be interested in a movie about the character of Pitt's sister, an a British officer openly living as a lesbian during the Blitz.

Tags: espionage, movies, spies, ww2

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01 December 2016 @ 10:13 am

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

An enjoyable bit of Harry Potter-dom. The magical creatures were the best part not surprisingly. Also not a surprise, the villain reveal. And the Shaw family stuff felt fairly pointless. Honestly the movie probably would have been tighter and a better story if it jettisoned all the excess plot and just concentrated on the whole fantastic beasts. Just Scarmander and his new muggle buddy running around New York trying to retreve escaped magical creatures before they or the humans were hurt. But still,not a bad movie.

Tags: fantasy, harry potter, movies

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16 November 2016 @ 10:20 pm

Arrival

Part way into this I started thinking about the Schlock Mercenary webcomic. In that I was thinking to myself "Army dude, you're trying to blow up aliens who can manipulate gravity with some cases of C4. Thats not going to work." But aside from the lack of psych evaluator as part of the U.S. translation/contact team, I quite enjoyed it. Clever and well-acted.

Tags: aliens, movies, scifi

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09 November 2016 @ 09:59 pm

Dr. Strange

The fx were pretty great (even going to a non 3D showing). Cumberbatch was pretty good, he does jerk genius who is still kind of likeable well as always. Mikkelson was about average for a Marvel villain, which is an admittadly low bar. Rest of the cast was good. I'd say a B- for a MCU movie and a C+ as just a movie. I did like the solution for defeating Dormammamuamamamamu.

Tags: magic, marvel, movies, wizards

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29 September 2016 @ 07:40 am

The Magnifcent Seven

An enjoyable enough bit of Western violent fluff. No where near the level of either the original tM7 or Seven Samurai. But the characters (with the exception of the waaaaaay over the top Robber Baron villain) were an ok bunch of character tics and tragic back story simulating actual character. Also I always forget how huge D'Onfrio has gotten. Even with seeing him in Season 2 of Daredevil this year. Also of the various heroes, his mountain man felt the most developed.

Tags: movies, westerns

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