Monster Zero x SciFi Japan - Archive Only

Spider-Man 2002 - 7/10

Spider-Verse - 10/10

I saw last night spider verse is up on Netflix now! I missed out seeing it in the theater unfortunately, so I’m looking forward to checking it out.

^ It's one of the best comic book superhero movies because it manages to replicate the excess of style and expressiveness that is capable in the best comic books.

I've been absorbing the awesomeness that is the Criterion Collection release of Jackie Chan's Police Story and Police Story 2. Abundant special features, the films look light-years better than the crappy versions that have been available for years, and they're just two of the most kick-ass movies ever made!

Spider-Man 2 - 7 or 8/10

Detour - Well that was quite different than I expected. Really good too. Not sure there is much more I can say. 9/10

Superman Returns I still like this film, flaws and all. I feel like it gets forgotten because it came at a time between Nolans Batman films when DC was just *kind of* thinking of doing an interconnected universe, but didn't quite know what to do yet, and MoS which officially got the ball rolling, but is incredibly divisive. I applaud Return's efforts, even if some 13 years later it's director, and lead antagonist are pretty despicable people in real life.

So many times when an IP is being redone we hear directors and actors say they want to *make it their own* which is fine. But when young Brandon Routh was asked basically to imitate Chris Reeve in the most loving and endearing way, he nailed it! Admittedly, this story was a bit stale, they could have chosen any villain besides Luthor or Zod, and this film would have been instantly better. But even in the DCU, WB seems to be hesitant to bring any of Superman's other iconic villains to screen, which is so frustrating. Basically after the missteps of Superman III and IV in the 80's, SR gave us something I thought we'd never get, a return to that original continuity of Superman films that started back with the original in 1978. For me, it redeemed the franchise. There is a saying I hear often, once you leave home, you can never go back. This is true for the most part, but I'll always enjoy Superman Returns for giving us one more look at something that was once really great.

Spider-Man Far From Home - 10/10

Spider-Man: Far from Home gives us a solid 21st century take on Mysterio, does a good job of peeling the stakes back such that it feels like a more apropos solo-hero film, and does a really good job of building the Peter-MJ relationship. It's got a couple nice surprises (including one cameo I wasn't expecting AT ALL) and is a solid meat-and-potatoes MCU movie. It's got its share of issues (most of them very much 'this is what every MCU movie does' type stuff, and also one scene where the movie just stops and Jake Gyllenhaal explains to a bunch of people who should already know "the plot thus far") but it's fun and Gyllenhaal chews scenery as only he can and gives us yet another good MCU villain in what's becoming a nice trend of consistently good villains. 4/5.

Blue Velvet - This is the first time I've ever been able to sit through an entire David Lynch movie. It was good. Interesting, but it could have easily been 20 minutes shorter. Nevertheless, it isn't anywhere near my bottom Neo Noir list, more like middle range. I give it a high 7/10.

I too saw SM: Far From Home, easily my favorite Spidey film to date and I too was not expecting that cameo jelly. In fact the entire audience cheered for it. For more of my thoughts on the movie I created a topic in the Movie subforum.

Double Indemnity - 10/10

“Spiderman: Far from Home”. It was OK. For me, it was really just that – OK. I don’t know if it's Marvel fatigue or Spiderman fatigue, but this movie did not enthrall me as “Spiderman: Homecoming” did. I really do like Tom Holland who makes for a very likeable Peter Parker. The best scene in the entire movie, I thought, was the one that played during the mid-credits! However, I did not at all care for the end-of-credit scenes.

Glass - I understand why this movie is called Glass now. Not because that is the name Jackson's character, but because that is how fragile the script was and they shattered it to pieces. It took everything that made Split so damn good and threw it away for a boring ass mess that felt like it was 3 movies crammed in one. The editing was terrible, the acting was bad, but most of all, the plot just didn't make any god damn sense. It doesn't help that the movie had no idea what the "OH GODZILLA! WHAT TERRIBLE LANGUAGE!" it wanted to be or do. Then when things FINALLY started to pick up, it falls off another cliff for some bullshit "twist" that just comes out of left field, yet, was extremely predictable. I hope Shamylan is done with this "OH GODZILLA! WHAT TERRIBLE LANGUAGE!" ass universe, especially since we have REAL comic book movies that know what the hell they are doing these days. Maybe this would have worked in 2004, but not in 2019. Overall, I give it a 5/10 because it was only half as good as it should have been. This is without a doubt The Amazing Spider-Man 2 of the fake comic book movie world.

Escape Room - I watched this expecting it to be really bad and it was actually fairly entertaining. There were some legitimate moments of suspense and it was just a good time. Far superior to that garbage Glass movie. Now granted, it's nothing special as it was pretty much Saw V but good. Overall, I give it a nice 7/10. Not sure it needs a sequel though.

Shout Factory's Gamera vs. Guiron, first the regular feature with the Sandy Frank soundtrack, then the MST3k version!

"Gamera is really neat!
Gamera is full of meat!
We've been eating Gam-er-ra!"

Mothra 9/10

Finally watched Marvel's Captain Marvel. Fury, Talos, and the cat were the best parts of that movie. I'd watch a TV series with just them in it.

Finally got around to watching Bumblebee. Yeah, it's a by the numbers storyline that you can almost predict the characters lines before their said. But it is extremely well done with lead characters that you do like, and the nostalgia button is pushed just enough to keep you wistful. The F/X were effective, I really liked the bots transformations, much cleaner than in the Bay films. And the Cybertron sequence left me wanting a film set there. The only downside was that the John Cena character was so one dimensional the film was dragged down every time he was there trying to be Dwayne Johnson.

The Trouble with Harry - An enjoyable quirky Hitchcock comedy. 8/10.

Shout Factory! Gamera vs. Gaos along with their MST3K disc. Simple, guiltless, inane, fun.

Crawl

Are you scared of alligators? Being trapped during a hurricane? Or maybe you've just a fear of the claustrophobic griminess of your house's crawlspace? Well, this new film combines all of those fears as one sleek little creature feature, the kind of film that proves once again that you don't need a huge budget to craft a crowd-pleasing roller coaster of a film.

Anybody see Mid Sommar? or however it is spelled.

I really enjoyed Hereditary but I was a little worried Mid Sommar might be "Torture Pornish."

The Kid Who Would Be King - This movie was way better than it had any right to be. It was fun, entertaining, well paced, featured good acting, it made fun of the "chosen hero" tropes a bit, it was fully when it knew it should be, and overall, just a blast to watch. It does fall into the cliche category in the last act, which ultimately hurts the film, but that aside, it is something I would watch again if it happened to be on TV or something. Additionally, the movie did something I haven't seen a movie do in a long time, NOT sequel bait at all. It felt like this was the entire story and that was it, nothing more to tell. I hope that is indeed the case. I'm giving it a solid 8/10.

Batman vs TMNT - I am really surprised at this because I wasn't sure what to expect, but for being a newer animated DC film, and a Batman one at that, it wasn't bad. Highly enjoyable even. Batman was not a completely and utter jackass here, which I haven't seen done in over a decade. The Ninja Turtles were great, especially Mikey who really stole the show. Shredder was bad ass, but I feel like they didn't really take advantage of him teaming up with Ra's. There was so much more they could have done between those two as there were times when it seemed like Shredder was a complete lackey of his instead of his conqueror. I also don't like how the only character that seemed to know how to pronouce Ra's' name right was Damien. Everyone else called him Raaz, which is getting "OH GODZILLA! WHAT TERRIBLE LANGUAGE!" annoying. Of course, I honestly felt the voice acting in this one was hit or miss. Troy Baker was trying way too hard to imitate Kevin Conroy to the point where they should have just gotten Conroy instead. Why give us a cheap imitation when they could have easily gotten the real thing? Also, Damien's voice was off, but the worst was Ra's'. He was just awful all around. I haven't felt a DC voice was this miscast since Vin Diesel voiced Batman in New Frontier. The action was great, it was well paced, a lot of cool easter eggs, and there were some truly epic fight scenes, especially when it would use shadows and you would just see certain colors like Mikey's bandanna and Damien's yellow bits. Overall, I'm giving it an 8/10.