“CAPTAIN MARVEL”

Captain Marvel is the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to have a female superhero as the lead character, a huge milestone for the franchise but it also marks the final stop before the end of Phase 3. The film was in talks for quite some time over how it was going to go ahead, which version of Captain Marvel was going to be used and whether they were going to stick with Carol Danvers and fortunately they decided to do that. However, this has not exactly been one of the most hyped Marvel films in recent memory, I think that is due to the fact that this film is going to be coming out just before Avengers: End Game and considering how cataclysmically epic that film was and how much we’re all excited to get round to Avengers: End Game, I think this ultimately was going to feel like a damp squib. However, the post credit scene of the Avengers: Infinity War directly referenced Captain Marvel so we knew that this film might, at the very least, be a set up towards that film.

The film has been written and directed by the team of Ana Boden and Ryan Fleck, the team behind films like “Half Nelson” and “Sugar”. When I heard that they were going to be behind this film, I was actually rather surprised, considering that they had done a lot more television work than film work, which ultimately could have been an odd decision, however, I also did notice some prominent Captain Marvel comic writers were overseeing the story as well, so that gives you some hope.

Captain Marvel is actually an MCU prequel of sorts. If you’re familiar with the MCU timeline, since this takes place in 1995, that is after Captain America: The First Avenger and before Iron Man. Captain Marvel is the story of Vers, a Kree warrior who is commanded by Yon-Rogg, who is played by Jude Law in their battle against the Skrull, a species of shape shifting aliens who can take on the form of any person that they see, right down to the DNA, but can only copy the recent memories. A squad of Skrull get in from capture during a mission and get information that a device they are looking for is on earth. Vers follows them to earth to take down the Skrull team, led by Talos played by Ben Mendelsohn, where she runs into a young Nick Fury, played by Samuel L Jackson who starting up S.H.I.E.L.D, although he is not quite leading the whole operation at this point. Basically, this film kind of half adapts the story’s secret invasion which is an interesting choice for just a Captain Marvel story, to say that the invasion was pretty much an event comic, if anything it could easily be an Avengers’ storyline, however, where Captain Marvel goes with it is actually rather interesting, however I do have to stress, if you read a lot of Marvel comics not much will surprise you here. Captain Marvel’s plot is actually rather more streamlined than many of the MCU films have been in recent memory. Whilst it is ultimately a character set up film, rather like Antman and Spiderman: Homecoming, it ultimately feels like a filler to get us to the next Avengers’ movie, it doesn’t create the massive impact that say the Captain America films do.

That leads me to the Skrull, who are actually very well done in this film, one of the few real surprises in this film and they really work in their role as antagonists, and despite the fact you see most of the plot twists coming, one of the twists to the film is actually rather surprising. That being said, however, Captain Marvel is a pretty basic fish out of water story. The 90’s setting is not just in the landmarks like Blockbuster still being around and the very heavy grunge soundtrack, it also has the look and feel of a 90’s blockbuster especially in the first half being on earth. The second half actually kind of redeems the film, if anything the first half kind of dragged and was very exposition heavy, it is at that point it becomes more of a character piece on Captain Marvel herself.

Her origin story is mostly kept intact with only a few minor changes but ultimately, I really quite like where they were going with this film and Captain Marvel herself is an excellent lead. I can certainly see future films with this character in the future of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The action scenes, for example, are actually really well done and they work really well with the power set that Captain Marvel has and for Marvel fans seeing the Skrull’s shape shifting powers is a really great effect. In fact, the effects in this film are really the best part, especially the effects to make Samuel L Jackson and Clark Gregg reprising his part of Agent Coulson making them look like younger versions of themselves, Jackson looks like he’s stepped out of some of his films from the 90’s. Nick Fury and Agent Coulson aren’t the only throwbacks to other Marvel films, because this is set in the past, we also get other characters, particularly from the Guardians of the Galaxy films, Germain Hunt reprises his role from Guardians of the Galaxy and as the trailers pointed out we also have Ronan the Accuser, the villain from the first Guardians of the Galaxy film in this one, once again played by Lee Pace, the latter of which feels very underwhelming. The performances are pretty good across the board. I heard that people were sceptical about Brie Larson in the role of Captain Marvel, but I was definitely not one of those people when she was announced for the role and I was completely correct, Brie Larson is brilliant in the role and gives a great performance. Samuel L Jackson is finally allowed to have something to do in one of these films after such a long absence and his presence really adds something to the film, even if his performance can go a little bit to waste since you might end up concentrating a bit more on the effects and the fact that his character is finally given something to do. Other great performances include Jude Law, who I thought would be a bit out of place in this film, but he actually takes to this role really well. Annette Benning who once again gives a very good performance. Even the smaller roles are pretty good. Ben Mendelsohn proves that he is an underrated actor. Fan of Humans may struggle to recognise Gemma Chan’s small bit role. Aesthetically, however, this film is still the Marvel Cinematic Universe for the most part. There are definitely parts that make it feel like it is taking place in the MCU especially parts involving the Kree and the space aspects of the film, when we’re on earth, however, it feels a bit more separate, probably because of the 90’s setting because we’re used to the Marvel films being a bit more modern and I reckon that could be a bit more jarring. Captain Marvel ultimately has an underwhelming first half, but the second half makes up for it and I really thought the film was really good by the end and I think it is rather a genuinely good set up for the Avengers: End Game next month. As a film franchise goes I think Marvel could easily stick around with this character, however if I were to compare it to the DC equivalent of this milestone that being Wonder Woman, I think Wonder Woman was a more consistent film and did more interesting things with the character and plot than this this film did but that’s not to bash Captain Marvel which would easily watch again. I saw this film in 3D, but I don’t think this is actually worth it as much outside of a few scenes, especially scenes involving flight, where height was a factor and scenes with the Supreme Intelligence. If you have liked the Marvel Cinematic Universe up until now, this is not one that you should skip despite the rather mixed reviews from critics.

“FIGHTING WITH MY FAMILY”

Just a heads up, I’m going to be reviewing this from the perspective of a wrestling fan so there might be a few points where I may say a bit of jargon that only wrestling fans are really going to know, but I will try my best to be as to the point as possible. To be fair though, it’s going to be very hard to separate that because, the fact of the matter is, I’m a huge wrestling fan, I have watched WWE since I was 10 years old. I really, really, really love watching it. I watch it every week, it’s thrilling. One of the great lines in the film is “it’s not fake, it’s fixed”.

We are now in an interesting point in history where WWE has had long success with the mainstream public and as a result, wrestlers are becoming more and more popular, sure it’s not quite reaching the levels that you had during the turn of the millennium, but it’s still out there and WWE obviously have, for some time, become a production studio. Surprisingly, in that entire time, despite them making vehicles for their wrestlers to break out into the acting business, they surprisingly, until now, have never really made biopics. You would have thought that out of all the wrestlers to pick to get a biopic, the first one isn’t Hulk Hogan, isn’t Stone Cold Steve Austin, isn’t even The Rock or Daniel Brian, it’s Paige. Now that’s not to say that Paige’s contribution to the business has been insignificant, far from it, Paige could potentially, had she had a better string of luck, could have been one of the most successful women in the company and really helped to revolutionise a lot of the business. She was the first ever NXT women’s champion and still holds the record of being the youngest women’s champion in WWE’s history and, as far as I’m aware, is still the only English born women’s champion prior to the introduction of NXT UK.

My suspicion is that WWE’s promoting has licensed her story to be heavily involved because they are trying to promote their big women’s revolution movement which has had a lot of success and women have received much better air time and much better events, including taking part in their own versions of several of the matches which were previously male exclusive events and most recently crowned the first ever WWE women’s tag team champions last month and later this month will be having the first ever all women’s wrestle mania main event. To say that the company’s booking philosophy has come far is nothing short of an understatement.

Paige was a big front in all of this as the film kind of explains, just based on she did on her first night on the main roster but does the story of how she got there work as a film? As you would expect, the film centres around the fact that Paige comes from a wrestling family, her real name is Saraya Knight, and in this film she is played by Florence Pugh. Saraya has been working as a wrestler since she was 13 alongside her dad Ricky, played by Nick Frost, her mum Julia played by Lena Heady and her brother Zak, played by Jack Lowden. After a WWE event comes to London, Zak and Saraya go to take part in an open audition and while Paige gets the call up, Zak does not, leading to a riff in the family and Paige being sent thousands of miles away to Florida to train to be a part of NXT and possibly the main roster of WWE television.

Ok, here’s what you’re probably asking, how accurate a biopic is this? Well, from what I know of Paige and her story and my insights into the wrestling business, it’s kind of accurate, there are quite a few things that, I wouldn’t say have been fabricated, but are more an amalgamation of several things that were going on at the time. Take for example, the three women that Paige spends most of her time training with, they’re actullay based on any of the women that competed in NXT at the time but more an amalgamation of a few of them at that time. They do also initially make them seem more like the classic divas that the company used to really turn their female athletes into, possibly more to emphasise about the impact of Paige’s career. Now, you might be thinking that this takes place only a few years ago, what’s the point of making a biopic about Paige, she’s still relatively young, well that’s just it, Paige’s career is over at this time. The film ends with her first night on the main roster, but it doesn’t actually show her career after the fact. She had a few controversies as well as a few ill-timed injuries and unfortunately, last year she was forced to retire at the age of 25 following a neck injury which forced her to end her career , just before the first women’s royal rumble, which must have been a gut punch. As a result, this biopic is actually very well timed in a sense.

This film is written and directed by Steven Merchant who you wouldn’t expect to be involved in a film like this, but he actually brings an interesting edge to it and in a sense, it is the Britishness of it all. Despite the fact that this film was based on something very American and a lot of the film takes place in America, it is actually rather surprising that this film is essentially almost like a British comedy. It has a lot of the sensibility of it, a lot of the setting of it, it’s a very feel good film. The wrestling company that the family run train a lot of the kids in the local area to keep them out of crime and Zak and Paige are even training a blind wrestler, which I actually assumed was a fabrication for the film but no, it’s actually true, good work!

Merchant’s script though is one of the real highlights, the writing in this film is nothing short of excellent. The film really has an understanding of the wrestling business and just how truly hard and demanding it really is. This is where Zak’s part really comes into the whole film. Zak really does kind of represent the several Indie wrestlers that try their best but won’t succeed, especially now that in WWE terms, you don’t necessarily get to the main roster, even if you pass the early audition, if you flop in NXT, you’re out of there. Zac’s portrayal in the film and considering he’s such a hard worker, does make you wonder why he wasn’t picked, well the film does explain why a lot of people don’t get picked, it’s very hard to succeed in this business. It is aided brilliantly by an excellent performance by Jack Lowden.

Now obviously this film is not a scathing critique on WWE or the wrestling business, WWE would never sign off on that. We are hardly talking about the level of drama of “The Wrestler” starring Mickey Rourke, which is another film I’m very surprised WWE promoted considering what it implies their wrestlers go through, but it doesn’t exactly pull its punches, which is particularly true from Vince Vaughan’s character of Hutch, who is the trainer at NXT although he’s not a real person he’s actually an amalgamation of several of the trainers, although luckily they kept out most of their more controversial trainers aspects to his character. This is actually again one of Vince Vaughan’s best performances for a long time, I think he is actually a very talented actor which a lot of people don’t give credit to and it’s films like this that actually highlight that. The other performances are also excellent, there’s a brilliant cameo by producer, Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson, who seems to be having a ball playing a more comedic version of himself. As well excellent performances from Nick Frost and Lena Heady and I think they have both had career highlights in this film. Obviously, the real focus is on Florence Pugh’s performance and she knocks it out of the park as well, giving an excellent lead performance. Unfortunately, due to the timing of the film, this probably won’t happen, but I think her, and Lowden should really be considered for award season next year, they overall really nail it. They also really nail the chemistry between the four of them, you can believe they are a genuine family.

If you go into this film expecting quite a few wrestling cameos, don’t get your hopes up, there aren’t that many, the only ones that were really visible were The Big Show and Sheamus. John Cena is only in the film as stock footage of him!

The film plays rather fast and loose with NXT, treating it more as just a training session, whereas at this time NXT became and still is a televised developmental league, you can watch it on the WWE network right now. So as a result, pretty much all of Paige’s career on there and how she got herself over with her fans in a big way is kind of almost absent, it really shows how hard it is to get over with the fan base which is part of the deal. But with her first night on the roster you can see a big fan reaction to her from some people in the first rows, but the reason for that was because some of them knew her from her time in NXT. It also doesn’t help that the wrestler (AJ Lee) that she faced on her first night is no longer with the company is rather disgruntled. So they had to use Thea Trinidad, aka Selena Vega to play her, which makes sense since Vega is at least a talented wrestler who sports a similar style to AJ Lee, but man, fans are going to notice, she may be able to talk and act like AJ Lee but the long term fans will find it weird that someone who is currently on Smackdown right now is currently in this role. Speaking of which, the wrestling scenes are actually really well done, you can tell a lot of time has gone into the training and implantation gone into the role, so kudos there for that and the big moments really do make you feel like you’re at a proper wrestling show, the cinematography helps out as well with that.

Fighting with my family I was really worried was going to bomb big time and be a failing, however, unlike other films that depict wrestling, this one does treat it with the respect it deserves and tells you how hard it can be to get into the business and stay there, not just make an impact and the story it tells is a brilliant one, this is an excellent biopic about Paige, which may play a bit hard and loose with some of the facts, but at the same time gives real respect to her story and her legacy in the business. It is an excellent family drama about a less than conventional family. The central performances of Florence Pugh, Jack Lowden, Nick Frost and Lena Heady are some excellent ones and the film has a real respect to its audience which will resonate with both wrestling fans and outsiders, you don’t need to be a wrestling fan to really get into this one. This has been one of the best films I’ve seen in quite a few weeks and it has really uplifted my spirits. I really hope that WWE could potentially do more of these films. Here’s hoping that Chris Hemsworth will do a good job when he plays Hulk Hogan in an upcoming movie.

Apologies for the late arrival. We were caught up getting ready for NAS conference including the Anime Amigos article

Most of us will be away at the conference from Wednesday to Friday.

We will of course let you know of any new research etc that may be useful for us all.

Let’s get straight into this: I probably shouldn’t have to say this but of course there are spoilers in this part of the review. So, Reign of the Supermen takes place 6 months after the events of Death of Superman. People are still coming to terms with the fact that Superman is gone having fallen during the fight with Doomsday, but now in that time period we have had four new people attempting to take up the role of Superman. There is one who is known as “The Eradicator” who is voiced by Charles Halford, there is a new Superboy, who is being sponsored by Lex Corp and who is played by Cameron Monaghan, John Henry Irons, aka Steel, played by Cress Williams and a new cyborg Superman voiced by Jerry O’Connell. In the heart of it, Lois Lane, once again played by Rebecca Ronijn is attempting to get to the bottom of it or figure out if any of these could be Superman brought back.

Ok, Reign of Supermen is a decent film, all things considered with regard to its plot, although it’s not quite on the same level as Death of Superman. Given the fact that the film seems to have to juggle all four of these characters, given decent arcs and payoffs, which obviously means that at least one of them is going to be underdeveloped. On the plus side, they did pick the ones that are the most interesting, Superboy and cyborg Superman are the ones with the most amount of focus. Their arcs are generally ok, although Superboy feels a bit rushed at times, if anything Lois Lane is kind of the focus of the film and she is genuinely one of the best parts of it. The film seems rather fast and loose with its story, we don’t even wait all that long at time for all of the four new Supermen to be in the same proximity, within the first few minutes of the film there is a fight scene at Lex Corp between them. It is loyal to the comics, but that’s where it kind of falls flat. The comic storylines had this idea that DC were trying to come up with an idea of what could be a decent replacement for Superman and were simply testing the water to see which one of these would take off and while it is a genuinely interesting storyline, it doesn’t really hit its crescendo until the second half.

The one storyline the film does tend to stick with is the idea of a world living without Superman, how does this world cope after such a devastating loss. The second half leads to some interesting ideas down the line. Of course, there is an interesting idea about people trying to step up and be their own heroes and the various forms that that takes. If there is one thing holding the Reign of Supermen back is that there are a lot of good ideas but the film struggles to fit them into one film, once again the troubles of adapting a very long comic storyline. However, some of the scenes are genuinely, once again, great. For one, Bibbo Bibbowski is once again a highlight of the film and the film makers once again don’t over saturate him, but just as a reason for him to be in the film once again, despite the fact that they have bit of a rubbish way of writing them out of the plot and Rainn Wilson is once again surprisingly effective as Lex Luther, in fact the whole cast is pretty damn good.

The acting is genuinely half decent across the board, Jerry O’Connell is doing very well as a cyborg Superman, there is also excellent support by Rebecca Romijn as Lois Lane. Cameron Monaghan, who you will recall played Jerome in Gotham, does a really good job as Superboy, although you would never guess it was him. Charles Halford does a pretty good job as The Eradicator, even if he feels kind of underdone in the film. Cress Williams, who has been playing Black Lightning, is pretty good at being Steel, even if once again he does feel a bit underused. There are a lot of the cast reprising their roles to still good effect; Jason O’Mara is still good as Batman, Rosario Dawson is still half decent as Wonder Woman, even though these film makers have no idea how to write Wonder Woman. Nathan Fillion is depressingly underused as Green Lantern.

The animation, well there’s not much more to say about the animation, it’s pretty much the exact same thing I’ve been saying about all these DC animation films, it’s half decent but I’m not a great fan of Jim Lee’s art style, which they are trying to replicate with all these films that are set in this DC shared universe.

If I’m talking about the action scenes, however they are really good in this film. There are some genuinely decent action scenes all things considered, while none of them have the brutality that the Superman Doomsday fight had in the last film, the effort is certainly showing in the end.

I apologise that this film review is quite short but I don’t want to give too much away about this film given it’s short length, but let’s say that Reign of Supermen was no the best way to cap, it was not quite on the level of its first part but it was a decent conclusion to the Death of Superman story arc. The conclusion is pretty good, the side cast is good, the animation is good, it just doesn’t feel like a story that flows as well as the first part and there is less of a character lead to the first film. Still if you enjoyed the first part and you want to know how this story arc ends, then this is going to be excellent for you even though it is slightly predictable although I will encourage people to give it a watch.

The DC animated universe will be back later this year with the release of Justice League -v- The Fatal Five and that one looks like it’s going to be really good, but we’ll save that until that comes out.

It’s time to look at what I’m doing next, and its one that could be really damn good, it is a film written and directed by Steven Merchant, a biopic of a WWE Wrestler, next week I review “Fighting with my Family”.

“HAPPY DEATH DAY 2U”

Happy Death Day was a real anomaly when it came out. It was a surprise hit especially at the box office, which was surprising considering that horror films don’t tend to make a lot of money in that environment.

Happy Death Day doesn’t really need a sequel. The first film wraps up the plot rather nicely. Overall it is a pretty decent film, but, I kind of wish they had just left things where they are.

Once again this film is done through Blumhouse Productions and is written and directed by Christopher Landon. Though I should stress that the original story was written by Scott Lobdell, a comic writer for DC comics, known for doing a couple of decent story lines, though he is also infamously known for his terrible run on Red Hood and The Outlaws, as well as terrible work with the Teen Titans. But credit where credit is due, Happy Death Day is one of the stories that I actually genuinely like.

FURTHER WARNING: There will be spoilers for the first film.

Happy Death Day 2 takes place about a week after the first film. The film initially has us follow support character from the first film, Ryan, played once again by Phi Vu, who after going through a rather weird day ends up being killed by the thrasher baby-faced killer from the first film again. Immediately after this becomes apparent, Tree, played once again by Jessica Rothe, discovering the cause of the events of the first film and during an accident, ends up falling back to her birthday the previous week, now having to like the day again, knowing that this time the killer is after her and all her friends.

Ok, I’m going to level with you, this is a minor spoiler, but I am unable to talk about most of what I think of this film without mentioning it. So if you want to go into this film blind, this is your last chance.

So the film establishes that Ryan is working on a project with two other students, which has actually created powerful dimensions and time skips. So there is your solution to the first film.

This film is summed up in two words: unnecessary and over complicated.

This is one of the dumbest films I have seen in a while. It is phenomenal how much this film got me to care so little.

So this film is essentially once again a ground hog day slasher, but this time there is even less killing, since it is more about Tree memorising several calculations to send her back to her own dimension. Then there is also a few little twists which throw things into the mix, considering that, well, again, minor spoiler, Lori, from the first film, isn’t the killer this time. The actual solution to the mystery might have been interesting if they ever put any emphasis on it, but, this film barely does.

The eureka moment of the first film actually had a point and was kind of shocking since they actually made it a major focus, this time it is not really a focus. In fact the horror from this film has been cut almost entirely. There is very little action, well very little anything in this film.

I will give the film credit. It did actually do a very good job of subverting what I was expecting given the trailer for the film, but man, do they try way to hard. They do actually have some interesting ideas, but they let them wander. In fact they actually kind of bring up the explanation and ruin the whole point of the first film.

The first film was all about Tree learning to make the most of life and coming to accept her mothers death and celebrate her birthday properly. Given how hard it is for her, with not only her mother being dead, but she also shares a birthday with her. This film tries to add an extra sort of moment like that. It’s the thing that probably works the most about the film, but, it doesn’t quite work. The films throw away line actually kind of points it out. Here is a tip movie, don’t do my job for me.

What’s more, Happy Death Day has a very low body count, so slasher fans will not get what they want. The performances are actually generally decent and they do give you something to work with, but the script fails them constantly and I was so wishing they would get a decent line here or there.

Man, the horror fails and the comedy is not much better. There was a couple of funny lines I liked in there, but ultimately it didn’t really work so well. Again, I am trying to avoid spoilers as much as possible, but some of the dumbest parts of this film were the decisions they’d made that would ultimately change all the elements of the films.

Fortunately this will hopefully put the cap on it. Now there is a twist early on in the film, that might support a third film, but, that twist should have been handled in this film. Seriously, they bring it up early on and it is never mentioned again. Considering how monumental they treat it, I genuinely wonder if it is a deleted scene from another movie concept they had, which they changed their mind half way through, then forgot to take the scene out.

Happy Death Day 2U is a film with good intentions and some memorable scenes, but it is ultimately a film that fails on both the horror and the comedy elements, leaving me feeling cold. I’m genuinely not a fan of this one in several ways. It feels like a film that as not had enough thought put into it.

What’s more, I can’t help but think that the film is a slight cash grab for Blumhouse, considering the surprised success? Here’s hoping they are going to be done after this film, because I definitely don’t want any more in this series.

Well, that’s a depressing one. Next week I should maybe see the sequel to a film I reviewed previously, which I am actually looking forward too. Next week I review the DC sequel to The Death of Superman, Rein on Superman. I will be spoiling The Death of Superman almost wholly, so if you really want to read my review of Rein, you best pick up Death of Superman on DVD and watch it by next week. I seriously recommend it. Death of Superman is one of the best DC animated films in ages.

“ALITA: BATTLE ANGEL”

Alita: Battle Angel is very much a project that’s been in development hell. Cameron has been talking about this film for nearly two decades and he has been wanting to make it for quite some time. Silent Studios really don’t give a crap about making adaptations like this but its also a proof of Camerons influence, especially considering the recent success of the Avatar franchise.

The film is based on a manga by Yukito Kishiro, which was incredibly popular in Japan but its influence was not largely extended internationally. It had its fans, but it’s more got a cult following than anything else.

It’s not surprising then that the studio seemed very unconfident in this. I’ve been preparing to review this film several times, it’s been pushed back in the release calendar so much, which is a sign the studio didn’t have much confidence considering how it’s been done.

Cameron had intended to direct Alita, but unfortunately his plans stood in the way of that. He is though still in the project as producer, though he has a screenplay credit alongside Laeta Kalogridis, who was a script writer on Shutter Island, as well as the man who would end up directing it, Robert Rodriguez.

Now I’m a fan of Rodriguez for the most part. He has directed some really good films and TV, a few poor choices not with standing. Considering his work on Sin City and adapting that work, he seems like a decent choice to direct this film. Given that there is about to be a load of adaptations like this, and given that Ghost in the Shell that I previously reviewed tanked at the Box Office, has it really stood out to a more critical audience.

The film starts with Dr Dyson Ido, played by Christop Waltz, looking through a scrap heap from the floating city above him, only to find a cyborg named Alita, played by Rosa Salazar, who he repaired. Little does she know that at night he goes out working as a bounty hunter, and she wished to take part in the role in order to pay him pack and not face the burden. However, it soon becomes clear that she has a bit of a past to deal with as well as several people after her. That is a really, really, really watered down version of the story. Alitas plot is actually incredibly complicated. There is all sorts of mythology that they had to work in.

The film takes place in 2563 after an event known as The Fall, a war that supposedly wiped out most of the floating cities, with only this one remaining. There is also a lot of other factors, such as how the law works in this world and various aspects of the inner workings of the politics. It fortunately is all easily explained to the audience so people won’t feel lost, however, it does risk being very expedition heavy. Alita does not fall out of a trap. There is quite a few things that also are hinted at but never fully realised. For example: they make reference to Mars and its role in the plot, but that’s not really touched upon outside of that statement.

Lets talk about Alitas biggest positives. For a start the performances are all great, this is a great cast, including great performances from: Christoph Waltz, Jennifer Connelly, Mahershala Ali (who I personally think is incapable of giving a bad performance), Ed Skrein (who once again plays a great villain), Jackie Earle Haley, Keean Johnson, it is an excellent cast. The top prize however goes to Rosa Salazar, who does an excellent motion capture performance. I was a bit worried about them trying to replicate the style of the manga to heavily when I saw the first trailer since she does transfer from the uncanny value, but it’s thematically kind of important to show how different she really is.

First off, as someone who has actually read some of the manga prior to seeing the film, its amazing how accurate this film is to its source material. James Cameron and Robert Rodriguez have really gone out of their way to make this feel like that story has come to life. The special effects really support that well. You can tell that this was a passion project given just how well they do it. There is all sort of subtle little things they put in place. Such as the design of Ido’s hammer, aswell as smaller things in the costume department, all sort of references are there with an eye from the source material.

The special effects also really shine here. This is some of the best motion capture I have seen since Tin-Tin. It is not only very creative designs that reflect the source material very well, but also allows for really expressive movements and faces. I’ve often complained in the past about films that over rely on computer generated effects and digital effects, but this is a film that really uses them to its full advantage.

Now we come to the negatives. As I stated this film is very close to the source material. However, that’s just the problem. This was a very, very, very long source material and because they are trying to stick so close to the story, it means the can’t go off and do their own thing, which means this film now has to become a franchise and have a sequel. It definitely suffers from the biggest issue which I have with a lot of films these days, which is that it is preparing the sequel before it has got the first film done. There has not been a second film anoounced at this time, and it took very long for just this film to get made. I suspect this film will do poorly at the Box Office, though I’m hoping I am wrong on that.

Ok, while we are on the topic of negative points. I don’t exactly have a problem with James Cameron, I think when he’s actually good he does some great work. The one thing he has never been good at is dialogue. You can really feel that he’s had most of the writing credits in this film. It is deffinatley a Cameron script and has got some hokey dialogue in there. This is not an example of the keeping to the source material, you can definitely feel Camerons presents here. It feels rather like his other work, the dialogue will be recognised by anyone who has seen his other films such as: Avatar and Titanic. Much like those films it becomes evident that Cameron is much better at writing women rather than men. This was a point that first became apparent to me through one of Matthew Bucks reviews. It is definitely present here since he writes the women as rather well dimensioned characters, with very clear motivations and goals. But, the men come off as rather bland and uninteresting, usually in an unintentional way.

Another problem with Alita is that I think it will be a pretty exhausting watch for a lot of people. It is a very long film with a lot to take in and memorise. Fortunately its pacing issue really is only at the begginign, it kind of fixes itself towards the end.

There is also another negative factor, with how it treats one of its characters. There is a character moment that happens, which is rather interesting, only for that moment to be undone by another choice made towards the end of the film, which meant that several previous moments felt pointless.

Mahershala Ali is wasted in his role. He really delivers where he is given a chance to do so, but his character is rather underwhelming. Now he would have made an excellent choice to play the main villain, but he is actually more of an underlay to the other villain. Who by the way has one of the most ridiculous villain designs I have ever seen. He looks like Dr Insano.

One thing I can’t fault Alita on is the action scenes. This film is brilliant when it comes to its action sequences. Not surprising given who the producer and director are. It really understands how to do action scenes and it fundamentally gets them all right. Some of the real highlights include the motor ball sequence, the fictional sport which takes place in this world. As well as the bar fight amongst a bunch of bounty hunters.

Alita is a film that I like, but it also has some flaws which I think will make it unpalatable to a general audience and kill any potential sequels in the future. Though this film is definitely a pro example of how to translate a source material well to a film screen. The dialogue is a bit hokey and the film often feels as though it is trying a bit too hard, but overall I found more positives than negatives.

Now take this with a pinch of salt as I am not a fan of Avatar, but I personally think this is better than Avatar and I will stand by that. I didn’t see the film in 3D but I have heard tonnes of reports that this film is really good in 3D. My cousin saw the 3D version and she said it is the best 3D effect she has seen. So if you do get the chance to go to the cinema and see it, I recommend you find a 3D screening if you can. This is especially great considering there is not to many dark environments that will scewer the 3D effect. The characters are also very bright and do stand out in the darker environments.

Well that’s it for me this week, next week I will be going to see a horror film again, as I review Happy Death Day to You, the sequel to Happy Death Day. Word of warning in advance, that review will contain spoilers of the first film, so make sure you see the first one prior to reading the review.

“Glass”

I make it no secret that I’m not a fan of M. Night Shyamalan, though with that being said, in the time since I have become a semi-professional film critic, his work has actually really improved.

I reviewed The Visit which was a film that while not great, was certainly an improvement of what had been done previously, despite having an insane final act and Split was actually a genuinely decent psychological thriller. Of course, Shyamalan is well known for doing his plot twists, but amongst many circles he becomes known as a rather pretentious Director. This was no more evident than with his film Lady and the Water, but, Split seemed to be a real turning point for him, for the most part. It seemed though it may be getting him back on track.

By the way, I know this is probably obvious, but spoilers for Unbreakable and Split.

Yeah, of course, the twist at the end of Split was that it was entirely taking place within the Universe of Shyamalan’s previous film, Unbreakable, a rather deconstruction take on Superhero fiction. The plot of Split on the other hand was a psychological thriller about a man with multiple personality disorder, although of course the twist being that he doesn’t have multiple personally disorder, there genuinely are sever conscience living in his body and he is now known as the Hoard.

So, what we have now is a rather interesting take. Of course, the knowledge that Split was a phantom sequel to Unbreakable meant that we knew another film was coming along. That was of course with Glass. Another film that Shyamalan has made with Bloom House productions and promised to be a conclusive piece to this film series. Well that’s an interesting topic.

Taking place a few weeks after the events of Split the film revolves around David Dunn, the main character from Unbreakable, played once again by Bruce Willis along with his son Joseph, played once again by Spencer Treat Clark, trying to track down the Hoard played by James McAvoy. However, during a fight between the pair they are taken to a mental health facility by the authorities, led by Dr Ellie Staple, Sarah Paulson, who specialises in people that have delusions of super powers, insisting they are just their imagination. There we have our first problem. While in my opinion, it is an interesting idea to have the sense of the powers are not real and it’s in their heads. Which would make us re-think the other films. It doesn’t change the fact that Shyamalan’s used these entire films to suggest the whole thing has been real. It’s one thing to have a situation where someone has a sudden ungodly strength to bend bars based on adrenaline rush, I could buy that, but, David was in a train accident and came off with no injuries and was the only one to survive. We are in a situation which doesn’t work.

The film does bring back Elijah, aka Mr Glass, once again played by Samuel L Jackson. As the title suggests, it is kind of his film. He doesn’t actually say much for a while, except expounding tonnes of comic book story tropes. He does this because Shyamalan has a real need to spell out the plot that is going on. Yeah, Shyamalan’s never been one to really trust his audience to figure something out, he really has to spell something out.

Glass is a film with a tonne of issues. One thing, most of the cast of both films are back, including Anya Taylor-Joy playing Casey Cooke, who was one of my favourite characters in Split, but, man is she dumb in this film. She went from being one of the smartest characters in that film to just a real dumb ass in this one. I don’t know what Shyamalan was thinking scripting her like this. It’s seriously baffling. The script fails her constantly. The annoying thing is Anya Taylor-Joy is a fantastic actress. As I mentioned already she was great in Split and she was brilliant in The Witch. In those films she had good scripts to work with, this film seems to have her do some sort of quasi connection with the Hoard. Why? Because they are both tortured souls. HELLO, THIS IS A MAN THAT LOCKED YOU IN A BASEMENT IN THE ZOO! He is not a troubled soul, he is a deeply dangerous man. Yet, the film tries to sort of down play a lot of that in this one.

Granted though, James McAvoy is once again great as all of these personalities that he has to play, doing an excellent job of it, despite how hammy he’s been directed.

The film is a real slog to get through. I’m not joking, it was genuinely a really dull film compared to Unbreakable and Split, which I re-watched in quick succession before seeing this so they were very fresh on my mind. Those films had very organic flows, which suited to their story lines. Glass does not. It’s not as self-contained as Split and Unbreakable, it’s trying to be too big in a sense. It does that typical Shyamalan thing, constantly going over the head with the fact it’s meant to be incredibly deep, experimental and deconstructive, which he got away with in Unbreakable because he was restrained.

Shyamalan has not been restrained this time. He’s in full pretentious mode and half the film it feels like him once again lashing out at the critics giving bad reviews to his films. Shyamalan once said in an interview before The Last Airbender, that he wasn’t being given good reviews by the critics, to which the interviewer (who I think was one of those ones on ITV who fawns over the person they are interviewing) said, “the critics just don’t get you”. His response to that was, “they’ve never got me and it’s getting worse”. I’m here to set the record straight Shyamalan, we got you, entirely, we completely got you, we just didn’t like it. There is a big difference between someone not getting it and someone completely getting it and saying it sucks.

Now, Glass is by no means Shyamalan’s worst film. It is actually decently paced and he never betrays it with some really stupid ideas that don’t work. For the most part. He kind of really drops a ball towards the ending, including a plot twist. Shock horror, Shyamalan film with a plot twist, that really doesn’t add anything to the final film. In fact, it’s one of them ones where you go, Oh my god, that’s a bit of a shocking twist, wait, that doesn’t really impact anything that much. I mean this is hardly as irrelevant as the plot twist in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, but, my point still stands.

What’s more, Glass feels like a film that is constantly trying to do more than it needs to. I actually thought Split being set in the unbroken universe kind of played it, so they kind of took away from that film more than it added. It’s more evident here when they are trying to merge these two very different films together.

Plus, the film can never stick with, who is the bad guy? It constantly changes its opinion on what the characters motivation is. As a result, it is very difficult to get a grip on anything.

The acting is at least pretty decent. Bruce Willis is still pretty good in the role. James McAvoy, as already mentioned, is really entertaining in this role, though he has lost a lot of his creep factor that he had in Split. Samuel L Jackson is entertaining, even in bad films. Sarah Paulson gets a good performance as the new character Ellie Staple, who does a good job being the Psychiatrist, trying to make them all think they are crazy. But, again, these performances are rather undone by the fact that the fight scenes are once again terrible.

The one thing that’s happened with comic book movies since Unbreakable, is that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has come. That’s the thing, you can’t get away with this post Marvel. I don’t think audiences are cynical enough to go into, this is how a fight scene would look if you done it in real life.

It’s just kind of ergh as a whole, and that’s this film in a nutshell. It’s a very meh film. Glass is a decent attempt, but it ultimately falls flat. M Night Shyamalan tries a rather daring task of trying to mould two very different films together, and he doesn’t really end up succeeding very well. This is a shame as it is coming at a time where Shyamalan was actually on the rise and doing much better. This feels like a massive step backwards for his career. I personally think Shyamalan might have another good film in him, but I’m starting to think he’s going back down a rocky path. This film is not a good sign. Despite some decent performances, the script fails the film constantly and this is one confused mess of a film. Third time unfortunate in this case was not the charm.

Well that’s all from me for 2 weeks I’m on holiday. Join me in 2 weeks where I’ll be looking into the latest Live action adaptation of a Japanese property, as I review Aelita Battle Angle.

“THE UPSIDE”

The Upside if a rather interesting film altogether which has been advertised as based on a true story which has not been entirely accurate. It is technically based on a true story but is also a remake of a French motion picture Les Entouchables, which I imagine this story was much closer to the real-life story of a French quadriplegic man who was looked after by a man from the French Guinea. This American remake has been directed by Neil Burger, director of Limitless as well as the first Divergent movie and if you have checked out my past reviews you will know I am not a fan of Divergent movies, including the first one. Needless to say, though the upside certainly had an interesting premise but its release at this time of year suggested that as this was a film both in America and the UK to me suggested that this film was probably buried as this wasn’t going to win any Oscars. My prediction was profoundly correct.

The difference between this and the French film is that it is set in New York and is about a rich quadriplegic business owner played by Bryan Cranston wo is being looked after by a former ex-con who is just out of prison who accidently walks into the wrong job interview and is hired and is played by Kevin Heart, the film from there on is more about the two of them learning something from one another and re-building their torn lives, yet is about as predictable as a film gets, if you are going to this film for any surprises say goodbye to them, it is about as formulaic as you think it is. It is based on an inspiring story but really at the end of the day you have to take this as a work of fiction since again this is more meant to be an adaptation of the French film.

The film itself has quite a few different highlights such as Kevin Heart’s character fixing the wheelchair to make it go faster, while there is a sub plot surrounding him wanting to be a better father for his son to ensure that he doesn’t end up in prison like he did. There may have been a sub plot around one of Kevin Heart’s friends possibly leading his down the wrong path but there is only really one scene for it, and it is dropped from the film really quickly, that being said however it is not incredibly well thought out and that is what most of this film’s biggest problem is. Most of it is not well thought out, some ideas are damn decent but the whole film seems rather half arsed in a lot of areas, particularly with the business associate played by Nicole Kidman who no offense to Nicole, she does a very good job her character is written poorly, she is the most stark character is the whole film and her half of her plot feels like it has been missing.

The film is also phenomenally short, and I really noticed much of the film was in the trailer. The biggest thing that seemed to be omitted was the use of music as a thematically which is a shame because that is actually one of the better parts of the film. Nezam Dorma is played regularly as well with a few different with a few different operas as Bryan Cranston’s part is a fan of opera as well as the use of music by Aretha Franklin who is Kevin Heart’s character’s favourite artist, culminating in a very musical piece end of the film. On the one hand I am actually kind of glad since I think trailers are now showing too much of the films and this film was a prime example there was very little that was not from the trailer. Okay, that being said if you don’t want a film that is going to make too much this film is pretty good all things considered.

I actually found Kevin Herat and Bryan Cranston to have very good chemistry on screen and their dialogue is actually genuinely quite funny. Kevin Heart also surprised greatly in the performance category. I have made it very clear that I am not a Kevin Heart fan, but this is one of his best performances to date, he really gets a chance to show a lot of range which he has not previously had an I hope that he carries that into future roles, although how many he will get is rather dependent given the controversy surrounding his removal as a host from the Oscars which we won’t get into for the purpose of this review. The controversy we will get into very briefly is the casting of Bryan Cranston as a quadriplegic man, something I didn’t actually know about until I saw it was trending on twitter just before I sent to see the film. Now personally I didn’t actually see a problem with Bryan Cranston playing the role since in acting you are meant to play someone else but considering Cranston’s method acting he really does bring a decent part to the role. I think the controversy over his casting has been rather overblown though I suspect it was done for name recognition value. He does give a very good performance and I remember seeing a review that said it must be very interesting for a very physical actor like Bryan Cranston to be place into a role where he can’t actually do any physical movement, this is it though he really is showing what he can do with being very limited in what he can and can’t do in his performance.

The film is also excellent in its cinema topography and its place of locations. The film shows an excellent job of showing the disparage of New York as a whole showing both the side that the tourists get to see and the side of New York which is rather troubling. It is admittedly rather simplistically done but is not inaccurate.

Top 10 Worst Films of 2018

2018 was a pretty decent year for films overall but when I look back over it I find most of the films I was watching this year range from passable to extra levels on both ends of the spectrum. However, that does not change the fact that most of the films I saw this year where mostly in the mediocre category. Now granted, this year I saw less films than last year, so my spectrum of the films this year is not to the highest degree. This was down to a few factors, the beginning of the year didn’t help as I was doing a house move, which meant I had to limit the amount of cinema trips I could do, I also had several other projects I was finalising; trying to take Anime Amigos to the next level and finishing off my book.

These projects meant I had to spend more time at my home than usual, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t go out to the cinema. If I reviewed it, I saw it. In these lists only one film that I am going to mention was a film I didn’t review. So, forgive me if I haven’t seen films. Now obviously with that tight schedule, you’ll forgive me if I didn’t go out of my way to see films that were obviously terrible and received poor reviews as a result. I’ve only got so much time, I don’t need to go and see films I’m obviously going to hate, like, Mamma Mia Here We Go Again and Show Dogs, anyone that went to see that, from the sounds of it, god help you. Let’s go and assume Show Dogs is the worst film of the year and these are more supplementary prizes. Of the films I saw this year however, I didn’t see that many disastrous abominations, but, I did see a few really awful films.

Here’s a few I would like to talk about. Now, if you are new to the Axia Film Society and you haven’t gone back to my previous lists, here’s the requirements for a film: it had to be released to a paying audience in the UK in 2018, this means that films which premiered in America in 2017 but came out over here in 2018 count. I am also not counting film festival releases, so films played at film festivals this year do not count. However, films played at film festivals last year but received a general release this year do count. This also means I finally get to give some recognition to some of the really great films I saw at the London film festival last year, but we will save that for the ‘best of’ list. Many of these films are just disappointing, they are not incredibly terrible but as I mentioned, if I didn’t see them this year, it didn’t count. First off, some dishonourable mentions, I don’t want this to seem like an extra list so I am going to put these in alphabetical order:

• Mary Poppins Returns, Disney’s desperate attempt to keep the franchise alive stems out as an over the top film that has real focus and pacing issues and has nothing to separate it out from its previous movie that I am surprised it is not just a remake.

• The Strangers Prey at Night, here’s an unnecessary sequel to a film you forgot existed until this year. The Strangers is another horror franchise that seems to tie itself to some sort of sense of realism, which it doesn’t really warrant, further proof that this franchise was never meant to be a franchise. The film does have a bit more of a scope this time round, but as a result they lost a lot of the setting that made the first film so memorable.

Sadly, they were the only two I could accommodate. Now that’s the dishonourable mentions.

Here’s the actual list.

10. The Nun. Speaking of horror franchises that really seem to get my goat, we now have another entry in the conjuring franchise, which I think everyone is only now beginning to get sick of, but I’ve been bored of it for a while. The Nun is another example of a movie that does a lot of things technically right, but it’s ultimately reduced itself to a jump scare fest that is riddled with issues and it seriously bothered me how week the film was as a whole. This is a film that I felt really annoyed with after I’d seen it.

Here’s the weird thing, it’s not even the worst horror film of 2018, no, we will get to that later.

9. Fantastic Beasts the Crimes of Grindelwald. The original Fantastic Beasts was a decent film, but this film stinks of re-writes and retcons. It retcons so much about the Harry Potter universe it’s very clear that it makes you feel like J.K. Rowling’s been pressured into keeping this franchise going along as possible. The film is a lame slug fest, the entire film is a middle act with no conclusion, that will confuse more than it succeeds.

8. Game Night. It’s another lame comedy, with characters you don’t like, who you wish ill will upon the entire film and it’s so dull. This film was just weird in every sense of the word. The film is a complete waste of its talented cast, many if which deserve way better than to be in this film.

7. Pacific Rim Uprising. Pacific Rim Uprising has a lot wrong with it, and it is so disappointing it has come to this. The original film was a real surprise for me and I really genuinely enjoyed it as an excellent love letter to Japanese Anime’s giant robot and Kaiju fiction, but this new one is just another lame giant robot movie, that wastes whatever potential it had left, before building to a sequel that no-one wants.

6. Venom. Venom is LAME! Stop defending this film. I’ve heard so many people say this film’s alright, it’s not, it’s crap. The film’s fundamentally flawed with just this basic premise. Venom as a character just doesn’t work in this environment. Tom Hardy might be a talented actor but he really can’t work with the material he’s given. The post-credit scene suggests we are getting another one of these… good luck, I’m out.

5. The 15:17 to Paris. This is one of the most boring films I have ever seen in my life! I am not joking, nothing happens in this film. The film’s a whole build up to an event and the rest of the film we are just watching somebodies holiday video. I barely enjoy watching these on YouTube, let alone a massive cinema screen. What’s more, I had a hard time believing Clint Eastwood directed this film, this is his worst directorial job to date. If there’s anything this film has proven, it’s hiring the real guys, doesn’t make your film better, hire actors!

4. Slender Man. I’ve rarely seen a horror film made this badly, but Slender Man is inconsistent from scene to scene. It does its job poorly by having no suspense what so ever, turning it into a lame jump scare fest. Easily one of the worst horror films in recent memory and it is clearly a film that has been through terrible production trouble as they have no idea how the script is meant to go and even who the main characters are meant to be.

3. Robin Hood. I have rarely seen a film this appallingly bad. Robin Hood really takes the cake. This film is a completely appalling take on turning Robin Hood into a superhero, giving him an origin story. Everything about this film is terrible. The acting is awful, the cinematography is terrible, the action scenes are a waste of time and what was the point of hiring archery experts to try and train these guys when half this film is computer generated. Really this film is appalling, and when you make the Russel Crowe film from 2010 look good, you know you’ve done something wrong.

2. Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom. It’s rare that I have been annoyed with a film as much as this, but, Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom really does it for me. This is really a low for the franchise, having absolutely no merit to it. The special effects are terrible, the dinosaurs have become a complete after thought within this film and it’s got lame sub plots that go absolutely nowhere. The film is clearly a middle portion of a planned trilogy and has turned the dinosaurs into horror movie villains, that’s gutting the morals and ideas of Jurassic Parks decision. Don’t even get me started on that ending. The Jurassic Park franchise is on decline and this is the combination of it, god knows what they are trying to do with the sixth movie.

1. Sherlock Gnomes. I’d really just like to be fair to Jurassic World as it is at least on some levels competently directed and shot, even if everything else about it just seems to annoy me, and at least Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom in theory had a reason to exist. Who was crying out for a Gnomeo and Juliet sequel, could you please seek help because this is what we got. Gnomeo and Juliet was never a great film, but it was at least passable and it ended there. This film has no reason to exist, the limited humour the first film had is now incredibly lame, the animation is beyond appalling. Really, I’ve seen made for TV animated films that look better than this and good god this film has one of the most annoying villains I have seen in a film in a long time. It’s clearly a marketing ploy they then began to film around and it’s some cathartic justice that this is where Johnny Depp’s career has led him too.

Well that’s it, another year, another film I’ve hated aimed at kids.

So, if you want to hear how my best films of 2018 went, go check out that list.

Top 10 Best Films of 2018

If you’ve come from my worst films list, it’s the exact same rules. I will say once again this list is rather incomplete since like the worst films list, I did not go out of my way to see films that received tonnes of critical acclaim and a lot of the ones that looked like they were running for Oscars. This includes some films that I genuinely wanted to see based on critical scores, like: Wes Andersons, Isle of Dogs and the Lady Gaga, A Star is Born. Although with my limited time I obviously didn’t get a chance to see those films. So, if a film is missing here, it doesn’t mean I hated it, you will just have to look back through my review log to see what I thought of it, or if it’s not on the log for 2018, I didn’t see it. Most of the best films in 2018 were a real breath of fresh air since a lot of films I had seen last year were mediocre. In fact, the way it’s worked out there’s three films of the same genre that made the final 10. I tried to limit this one, but that being said here’s how it goes. Once again, the mentions are in alphabetical order so it’s not confused for a top 14 list:

• First Man. I thought First Man was a bit of style and substance and very much aiming for Oscars, but I would hardly say there’s a film I saw this year that was better shot and composed than how First Man turned out. It’s proof that director Damien Chazelle is one of the best directors working in Hollywood today. The film itself genuinely has issues, I wrote that in my review, but, I would be lying if I didn’t say it was one of the most memorable films I saw all year.

• Halloween. Halloween didn’t quite make the list as I decided the list was too big to have too many horror films on it, but I am surprised how many viewers were very critical of this film considering that in my mind it’s the best Halloween film in years. The film feels like a very back to basics that the franchise has been desperately clinging for. If you really liked the original movie, this is one for you.

• Hey Arnold: The Jungle Movie. Ok, this one didn’t make the list for a couple of reasons. One, it was technically released in 2017 virtually everywhere but us Brits didn’t get it until 2018 when it came out on DVD over here. The only reason I put it in is because I want to gush about a film that I personally signed petitions to get made.

The Hey Arnold Jungle Movie is a perfect conclusion to one of my favourite cartoon series and combines some of the best elements of the show, it’s practically a fans dream and is a love letter to a fan base from Craig Bartlett. If you loved the original series and for some reason didn’t know this film had come out, pick it up, it’s a perfect conclusion to the story and one that we thought we would never get to see.

• Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. I really liked this movie. I think my review was rather scathing, but I think that’s because I was just coming off playing the Spider-Man PS4 game and the story in that one simply blew me away. Spider-Verse has a really good story line and really puts Miles Morales to the forefront, proving that the character can lead a film. The fact that it wasn’t my favourite Spider-Man story of the year is what held this one back.

And now the actual list. There might be a few that surprise you in this one, but if you have been following my reviews for most of the year, these are the ones you really want to get in the New Years sales.

10. Mary and the Witch’s Flower. I know it seems sacrileges of me of all people to put the anime film this low on the list. But, Mary and the Witch’s Flower is not quite up to the standard to some of its Studio Ghibli counterparts that it has spawned from, considering this is the first film from Studio Ponoc who are and off shoot of Ghibli, including the director of When Marnie Was There which was my favourite film of 2016. It doesn’t change that fact that Mary and the Witch’s Flower was the best anime film I saw in 2018. Now granted that was because many of the anime films that people were raving about, I didn’t get a chance to see them unfortunately, like My Hero Academia 2 Heroes and unfortunately several that have received excellent reviews still haven’t been released over here, such as the Sound! Euphonium spin off Liz and the Blue Bird and cancer drama I Want to Eat Your Pancreas. Mary and the Witch’s Flower however is really an excellent film. I haven’t had the chance to watch this film with dub cast including Kate Winslet and Jim Broadbent, but I really enjoyed the film overall. It still has a lot of the Ghibli charm and I would still say on a technical level this film is very well produced and made.

9. The Death of Superman. DC really came back this year. While Aquaman was better than we were all expecting, DC’s best out this year was definitely The Death of Superman, which is one of the best animated films in recent memory. Finally doing the first half of the story correctly and really ramping it up for a second part that will be out later in January. This is one of the most humanising stories for Superman in recent memory, and it is really an excellent film, even if you are not into the character. It is further proved that Superman is not fundamentally a dull character.

8. Hereditary. Considering how well I reviewed Hereditary you’re probably rather surprised that I thought Hereditary is ranked this low. But, going back over it, I think Hereditary might have got a bit over-hyped. It’s certainly an excellent film. It’s a brilliant example of how to use a trailer to mis-lead your audience into what film you are actually going to be seeing, but, man is it a hard hitting film. It brings real terror and some excellent performances. It’s a film that gives you sheer terror and makes you ask constantly, “what the hell is going on?” Hereditary biggest mistake though is its ending, it is a bit off the wall and doesn’t quite work when you really think about it, but that doesn’t change the fact that the film leading up to it was fricking excellent.

7. Ready Player One. Yeah, this one is another one just for me. I was expecting this film to be really, really dumb, but this film was a lovely geek out session for me. I’ve heard the book fans complain about some of the changes from book to film, and now being more aware of them, I’m kind of glad they did make some of these changes. Though you’ve got to ask my colleague Elliot on that one, he actually has read the book and he actually agrees with me for the most part. This film is an excellent nostalgia fest for people, and not just fans of 80’s pop culture, but also for fans of excellent video games movies and tv shows. You could have excellent games of spot the references. It actually tells a decent story outside of just its references having them used to enhance rather than confide it. Ready Player one is just proof to this list is personal to me since on all acclaimed critical levels it is not as amazing, but when I look back on the year there is very few films that I had more fun watching at the cinema.

6. Black Panther. Yes, I know, sacrileges to have this film so low, but come on people, Black Panther was still excellent. Director Ryan Coogler really latches on to this film in an excellent way, and it’s really awesome what he has delivered to the MCU. This film is an MCU filler movie, but it’s a really good filler. It makes you see the world of Black Panther in a way he really deserves. I’ve never been a huge fan of the character from the comics, but the film version has really made me want to go back and check more of it out. Special props to Michael B. Jordan as Killmonger, who’s one of the best MCU villains to date.

5. A Quiet Place. This is a prime example of minimalism really strengthening a film. It doesn’t have the best effects or best cinematography but man does it use this to it advantage. I think this is a film that really benefits from what it can do with its horror elements, delivering one of the best scare fests of the year. The concept alone of having to stay silent in a world that’s so terrifying is even better than you would expect. Director John Krasinski really deserves a nomination for his brilliant directing on this film and special props to the entire cast who deliver excellent performances.

4. Coco. I had to put one film that was mainly in 2017 in America on this list, and between this and Hey Arnold, this one was definitely the better film. Coco is definitely one of the best Pixar films to date and one of the few reasons of why the anime community wasn’t completely trying to destroy the academy after the animation from Japan received Oscar nominations, because at least this was the one that ended up winning the Oscar. Coco’s two Oscars are very well deserved however since it is one of the most heart-warming stories from Pixar. One of their best casts to date, with some amazing voice actor performances and probably the best soundtrack I have heard all year. Songs like Remember Me and Un Poco Loco have been stuck in my head all year and I would so urge you to check it out if you haven’t already.

3. Searching. This film was one of the best thrillers of the year for most people, and in my opinion, the best. It’s a real surprise to me since it took a concept that I thought would never work for a film, i.e.: it is all done through Skype and web chats and it actually makes it work by shooting it like an actual movie, rather than pretending it’s actually happening. Searching has a great plotline though and keeps you constantly guessing. I’ve heard people feel a bit overwhelmed by the ending, but to be honest, I think it was very well crafted. In my reviews I actually guessed the twist ending, then doubted myself by new information the film gave me. Which either shows that the film is very good at misdirecting its audience, or, I’m not as good at predicting scripts as I thought I was. If you haven’t had a chance to see Searching, then go and give it a watch, it’s an excellent film.

2. Creed 2. Rather a late entry in this list, but I friggin’ loved Creed 2! When I saw the first Creed I thought this was going to be the best the Rocky franchise would get and any further films would not live up to it, but man was I about to be proven wrong. Creed 2 is a brilliant film. Doing an excellent job following up on some of the previous Rocky films while also tying it to this new generation. This film is just superb, Rocky fans need to see this film, it is just one of the best films I saw all year. The fight scenes are brilliantly directed, the aesthetic of the film is amazing and it did the impossible, it managed to do a serious take on Rocky 4 and make it work.

1. Avengers: Infinity War. Yeah, this is no surprise to anyone who has been around me all year. I’ve been on and on about this film all year. This is the MCU crossover I was waiting for and it did not disappoint. The film juggled a gigantic cast and made it work to deliver one of the most epic storylines ever, actually improving on its comic book source material. Yet again it delivered one of the best MCU villains with Thanos, whose performance by Josh Brolin should earn the man an Oscar nomination. Infinity Wars only gripe is the fact it really can’t be watched by itself, you need to have watched the films leading up to it for its full impact. But, man, that ending. I went to a midnight screening expecting the ending to have a cheering cinema, and everyone was just silent. Here’s hoping Avengers: Endgame that is coming out this year will be able to live up to it and conclude this era of the MCU perfectly.

Well that’s it for 2018. Now I am going to kick off 2019 by reviewing a film starring Kevin Hart and Bryan Cranston, The Upside.

With all that being said, thanks for reading this. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

“MARY POPPINS RETURNS”

So, you’d think, despite the fact that Disney is known for sequels they would have by now got around to following up on Mary Poppins, considering the fact it did have sequel novels and other stories to work from. But, no, it’s pretty much been nothing since the 60’s.

Look, I’ll be honest. I am the worst person to review Mary Poppins because on the one hand I have no bias going into the film, but, I also have nothing that is objectively invested in the film. I hold no nostalgia for Mary Poppins and I am not a huge fan of the original film. If anything, the thing that had me more invested in the film is the movie Saving Mr Banks, which is a pretty decent Biopic about the making of the film.

Mary Poppins Returns seemed like a weird idea to me. Though I was intrigued by the casting of Emily Blunt in the lead role as well as Rob Marshall being appointed as Director, the man behind Chicago. Disney obviously brought him on board after he did Pirates of the Caribbean 4.

The film is taken place several years after the events of the original Mary Poppins. The children Michael and Jane have grown up. Michael has a family of his own which he is struggling with, since the death of his wife. Mary, now played by Emily Blunt, comes back into their lives in order to take care of the children, in lieu of the fact Michael is going nuts trying to find his father’s shares in the bank so the house doesn’t get repossessed by the bank owner, played by Colin Firth.

Look, here’s the fact of the matter. Mary Poppins Returns is a film that might have flown back in the day but doesn’t fly now. This is a film that is seriously in need of some Ritalin.

You can really tell it is a Rob Marshall film, as it shows a lot of his strengths and also weaknesses. The strength being; the man knows how to direct a set, knows how to do cinematography very well, and he brings a lot of his excellent style which he used in Chicago to this film. I will say nothing into the choreography of the musical numbers. The set design is really good, but, it is obviously a set or a green screen. Mary Poppins Returns is never allowed to feel like an organic world. In fact, the most organic the film feels is during an animation sequence half way through the film which is obviously meant to replicate the similar animated scenes from the original film. The animation style did remind me of Basil the Great Mouse Detective and 101 Dalmatians. They even tried bringing back some nostalgia by having the penguins from the famous Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious sequence. Admittedly they do a very good job of making the actors seem as though they are a part of the animated world, that’s the most I can say about it though. The rest of the musical numbers really feel like they are in a devoid negiverse. I know they’re implying these are all parts of children’s imaginations but really it goes a little too far.

The film is at the most at the expense of the plot. The plot of this film is so basic and bare boned that it might as well be a remake, I’m not even kidding. The fact that it’s a grown-up version of the kids from the first film might as well mean nothing. Mary barely interacts with them and considering what a big part of their lives she was that seems odd. In fact, after Mary arrived Michael and Jane feel like very incidental characters. Jane especially is really odd, she has barely anything to do in the film, it is a huge waste of Emily Mortimer.

Before you say anything, I am not a big fan of any of the child actors. They are trying their best and they do sell the whimsy of the scenes but if you are the sort of person that is annoyed by child acting this is not going to be the film to change your mind. Stranger Things this ain’t.

Disney clearly got out their cheque book for this film because there is an all-star cast. There’re cameos from Angela Lansbury and Dick Van Dyke, not reprising his character from the first film. We also have other actors such as Meryl Streep in briefly. Julie Walters also gets a role where she is allowed to be funny. Ben Whishaw is one of the best actors in the film. David Warner also has a small part.

As I mentioned, Dick Van Dyke’s character from the first film doesn’t make a re-appearance. This time he is replaced by a lamp lighter, who was under his apprenticeship, named Jack, played by Lin-Manuel Miranda. Oh good, we’ve gone from an Australian playing a cockney to an American, at least he can kind of, somewhat do the accent. The marketing hasn’t really lied, he’s much more prominent in the film than a lot of the other main cast. Further cementing my opinion that this film is aiming to be more of a remake than a follow up.

The plot is so basic and so neglected that the musical numbers also have to make up for it. You know when you watch an action film and it feels as though it is never stopping to take a breath, that’s the kids version of this film, it never takes a break. There is hardly ever a slowdown. It is several musical numbers with barely any plot thrown in the middle.

I will say one of the best parts of this film is Emily Blunt as Mary Poppins, who does nail the role left over from Julie Andrews, you will be upset to hear unfortunately she does not have a cameo in the film. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Angela Lansbury’s part was supposed to be filled by her. Despite her saying in interviews that she read the books in research for the role rather than seeing the film, she definitely has the spirit of the character and is clearly doing her upmost best. This casting was definitely not a poor choice.

The green screen effects are obviously an improvement from the original films effects but as I mentioned before, because we are living in an age where computer effects are not much of a marvel, there’s no real sense of wonder from it. Hence why I think there has been an increased number of musical scenes.

Speaking of which, yes none of these are sounds from the original. The entire soundtrack has been rewritten for this film. This was always going to be a tough challenge. Considering that the Sherman brothers did an amazing job with the first one and it was one of the films that earnt them an Oscar. Whether you like it or not the Sherman brothers did compose an iconic soundtrack with the original Mary Poppins. Returns has been taken up by Mark Shaiman who did tracks for; Hairspray, The Adams Family and Southpark: Bigger, Longer and Uncut, to name just a few. He’s doing his best but, god all these songs fell out of my head as soon as they went in there. I have taken a bet on which song I suspect will gain the Best Original Song nomination. Spoiler alert- I reckon it’s going to be the last one.

I’m not going to lie; Mary Poppins Returns was an exhausting movie. This film is a whole lot of nothing really pieced together, with a bare minimum of musical numbers and feels more like a follow up. It does make me wish that some real extra effort had been put in place, and I’m someone that didn’t really enjoy the original film all that much, so god knows how annoyed fans of the original film are going to be.

If you like the classic Hollywood musical this one might actually appeal quite well to you, since it feels like a return to form for that, but god if you’re not into that this film’s really going to drag. Its good cast feels wasted in the film and it is a real shame too.

My cousin also went to see Mary Poppins Returns, after I had but before hearing my opinion. Now she is a big fan of the original and she was really excited to see this film, she even pre-booked her tickets which she has never done before. She was very disappointed and pretty much agreed with everything I have said. She was happy to see Dick Van Dyke back, even if it was as a completely different character and Angela Lansbury was also a memorable character for her, making the final scene her favourite part of the film. All in all, she was disappointed with Mary Poppins Returns and much preferred Aquaman which she really didn’t think she would as it isn’t her thing and only went as she was dragged by her friend.

Well, that was the last film for 2018. Join me back next time where I am going to give my list of my top 10 best films of 2018 and 10 worst films of 2018.

With all that being said, thanks for reading this review. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading it as much as I’ve enjoyed writing it.

“AQUAMAN”

So, the DC Universe finally makes a reappearance, or should it be the DC extended Universe. If you’ve followed the Axia Film Society for a while you will know I have reviewed all of the DC extended Universe film, apart from The Man of Steel, and I made it pretty clear that I didn’t really like that film. After Justice League was a flop both critically and financially, it kind of looked like the DC cinematic universe was dead. I mean there was nowhere really for it to go. All plans were up in the air. In fact, there has been tonnes of announcements made for films, but very few scripts are going through, very few directors are staying on their films and the status of the Universe is still up in the air. They can’t even seem to be getting out these films. Marvel averages two to three films a year under their system, but DC has only managed to get one this year.

Aquaman comes in after the disappointment of Justice League, which first gave us a glimpse into the character. There was not much to go on, but the film was kind of set up and ready to go. In the director’s chair we have James Wan, the man behind The Conjuring and Saw movie franchises. Now I kind of like James Wan in some sense, but I think a lot of his films leave a lot to be desired. It’s one of those films where you kind of enjoy it for the most part, but there is some little niggling thing that’s eating away at you. With that being said, I’m a big fan of the Saw movie Franchise and most of my misgivings with The Conjuring are more to do with how absurd it’s gotten and the fact that it tries to maintain the ‘based on a true story’ idea.

Aquaman has always been rather the jokey hero, but most of what we think about Aquaman isn’t actually true. For example; he is not restricted to water and he can do a lot more than talk to fish. So, I was hoping they would do a really good job of going into this film.

Aquaman as you can tell, starts out as the story of a lighthouse keeper named Tom Curry, played by Temuera Morrison, who falls in love with the flame queen of Atlantis, Atlanna, played by Nicole Kidman. They later get married and have a child name Arthur. The Atlanians however, don’t take kindly to this and force her back into Atlantis for an arranged marriage. There son eventually grows up to become Arthur Curry AKA Aquaman, played by Jason Momoa. He then later makes contact with a woman named Mera, played by Amber Herd, that his half-brother Orm, played by Patrick Wilson, is uniting the undersea kingdoms to wade war on the surface world and only de-throning him can stop this.

If you are familiar with the Justice League animated series on Aquaman or the comic storyline, Throne of Atlantis, which turned into an animated movie that I reviewed, most of this is going to be pretty familiar to you. Ocean Master though is an excellent choice to be the first villain of an Aquaman film, since he ties very much in to Aquamans’ character. Ocean Master though has always been a bit of an interesting character, though he is only really a one off. He can never really tie himself into the DC Universe, since well, pretty much all of his characters focused on Aquaman. In fact, that was one of my problems with the Throne of Atlantis storyline, it was so tied into Aquaman that it felt like the Justice League were wasted. Having this be a solo Aquaman story works out very well. If you are familiar with the 52 run of Aquaman this one will seem very familiar to you because it has tonnes of elements of that story line in this one.

Now this Aquaman storyline I do find to be a bit repeated, given my familiarity with the character. But if you are going to it blind, this will definitely be an entertaining film.

They do a good job of introducing the side cast, including his good friend and mentor Vulko, played by Willem Dafoe. It introduces Mera very well, who is an excellent character when written correctly, which once again she is in this version. You get Aquamans’ back story, the concepts of all the under-sea kingdoms, which I found surprisingly they put so much time and effort into introducing. While this film is not exactly an origin story, it more serves as a catch up, considering we have learnt so much about Aquaman in. Justice League, it does still service as a good introduction to the character.

The other thing to say is if you don’t like CGI in your movies, this is not one for you. This is a major CGI Fest. There is very little use of practical effects which to be fair, trying to do Aquaman and half the concepts from them comics, without CGI is damn near impossible.

I think my biggest problem is Atlantis doesn’t really have much creativity in this version, it looks more like some weird hybrid of Blade Runner and Start Wars. There are some call backs to the ancient Greek mythology that inspires Atlantis but there is not as much as you would expect.

The fight scenes themselves are actually done ok. This is actually where I had the most fluctuation. There are some fight scenes that are absolutely amazing and shot brilliantly. Then there is some that are just terrible. It goes back and forth almost on a whim.

What I can say though, about Aquaman is it seems to be going with this new DC initiative of making these films much lighter in tone. Since Justice League finally proved to the executives that these films do not need to be dark as hell. Finally, it is good to see some primary colours and scenes in the daytime in bright sunlight (didn’t realise how much I missed that). You could make an argument that they are trying to cater way too much to the people that enjoyed the Marvel cinematic universe, but it’s working for Marvel.

Jason Momoa does suit this sort of character quite well, and he once again plays the role really well. If you have seen the trailers and the posters, you are aware that they have actually gone for a costume close to his comic counterpart, rather than the really weird and muted grey one that they used in Justice League. Initially I wasn’t too keen on it because I thought that since Jason Momoa didn’t have the blonde hair of the comic character, it kind of stuck out against him, almost as if it was someone cosplaying who couldn’t be bothered to wear a wig. Fortunately, however, now the final film has come about, I can say it suits him a lot better in most of the scenes he is wearing it.

Aquaman’s popularity though really goes on if you are a fan of Super-hero films. If you are not then this is going to offer you nothing else. It’s very much a by the numbers Super-hero movie. It is a good by the numbers super-hero movie, but it doesn’t really stray off its path. DC fanboys will definitely get something out of it however as there is tonnes of call backs to various characters like the Trench, who have been an excellent part of the universe. The film is also not bogged down with references to the DC universe as a whole, probably due to the fact that we have no idea where DC is going with their extended universe at this point in time.

Patrick Wilson is doing a pretty damn good job at playing Ocean Master. I like Amber Heard as Mera. Willem Dafoe is great as Vulko, and most of the supporting cast does a pretty good job. A few surprising ones including a very interesting cameo by Dolph Lundgren, he seems to be having a pretty good year between this and Creed 2.

If there is one cast member I feel sorry for it’s Yahya Abdul-Mateen the Second, who has the role of playing Black Manta. He is one of the best parts of the film playing the character brilliantly. They get down to his origin story very well and Black Manta is honestly one of the best parts of the film, probably a more compelling villain than Ocean Master. But he is so barely in the film that he feels utterly wasted. This is Manta we are talking about, he’s one of the most iconic Aquaman villains.

The other actor who seems to be really wasted is Graham McTavish who played Dwalin in The Hobbit movies, but also this year gave an outstanding performance as Dracula in Castlevania on Netflix. With his talent he should be doing a lot more in. this film, where he plays King Atlan.

I would also suggest not bothering with this film in 3D. Even though I didn’t actually see the film in 3D there’s far too many scenes where I think the 3D’s not going to pay off. Especially in. a couple of scenes which are way too dark for a 3D effect.

Ok, Aquaman is essentially a decent film. I would probably put it second place in the running of the DC extended universe films up to this point, behind Wonder woman, but that again is not saying much given the quality of these films. Though that being said, I enjoyed this film a lot more than I enjoyed Justice League. If this is where DC is going forward with their films, I could actually see them possibly making a recovery, though at this stage they still kind of seem to be a bit in shambles.

The acting is pretty good, the cast is very talented. The special effects are a bit distracting with how computer generated they are, but they do bring Aquamans’ world to light. Its thankful to the comics, but also does its own thing to stand out. Jason Momoa makes an excellent lead for this film, but I don’t think he should be the lead taking the entire film franchise forwards. Nothing against the man, but I don’t think his character’s quite compelling enough to be the leader of the Justice League. Though I would love for the writers to prove me wrong.

As a film on its own, it does a damn good job, and in the lighter tone is very appreciated. Going forwards, I can see myself re-visiting this film. If you have a very negative view of Aquaman this might be the film to change your mind.

Well that’s it for another week, but I’ve got one more film to review. I made a promise to the team at Axia that I would review this film. So, before I go on my Christmas break, I’m going to try and get in a review of Mary Poppins Returns.

“SPIDER-MAN: INTO THE SPIDER-VERSE”

We now live in an age where there has now been 7 Spider-Man movies gone to cinemas, that is insane. It’s even actually caused people to ask the question, has there been too much Spider-Man over kill. Spider-Verse is pretty much Sony’s attempt to keep whatever piece of the Spider-Man license they have left, now that Marvel seems to be going full steal with Spider-Man in their cinematic universe. In order to make this one stand out, this would be the first time a Spider-Man film is led by Miles Morales, the character who took over from Spider-Man in the ultimate universe following the story line; the death of Peter Parker. At the time it was a big deal, the person in the role of Spider-Man would now be a black teenager. But, unlike Marvels more recent attempt to do this with the character with Iron Heart, Miles Morales was a terrific success, who ended up becoming a fan favourite, which led to speculation of his appearance in the Marvel cinematic universe. Apparently, it’s been confirmed that he’s in the MCU by the studio, but we are yet to see anything of him. Spider-Verse though has not only been told it will be an Origin film for Miles Morales, but would also be an adaptation of the Spider-Verse storyline, which is an interesting choice, given that the Spider-Verse is a relatively new story line. It only came about a few years ago. It was decently received and led to several other comic series such as Spider-Gwen which is still going strong, as well as Web Worriers which was not as good.

I went in giving this film a chance, especially given that it’s an animated Marvel film. This film not only has to do the whole Miles Morales gets bit by a radioactive spider and becomes another Spider-Man, which they unfortunately don’t go into the origins of the actual spider in this film, but it’s also the fact that developing Spider-Man’s set of powers, but that Wilson Fisk played by Live Schreiber in. this film is creating a device to open up the barriers between dimensions, which has let several spider people through. Including another version of Peter Parker, played by Jake Johnson, who now has to train Miles in the role of Spider-Man given that the previous Spider-Man was killed by Kingpin and now the two of them have to stop Kingpin and his gang of villains from setting off the dimensional gate again, but they gain some help from several other versions; including Gwen Stacy, AKA Spider-Gwen played by Hailee Steinfeld, Peni Parker, the futuristic Spider-Man, played by Kimiko Glenn, Spider-Man Noir, played by Nicolas Cage and Spider-Ham, a cartoon pig, played by John Mulaney, that’s not a joke, these are all genuine.

Ok, this film has a very tough task to do. Not only does it have Morales origin, it also has to create a super team of Spider-Men, and semi adapt a very obscure comic story line that will only be familiar to fans of recent Spider-Men books. Luckily this film does get it right. It will be very familiar to anyone who has read The Ultimate Spider-Man since it keeps up a lot of that books timeline origins, rather than going with Miles Morales’ recent origin, ??? origin after the event comics secret wars destroyed the ultimate universe and reset everything. It is still accessible to people not incredibly familiar with the ultimate Marvel Universe, though you may be wondering why the Green Goblin is a rather Hulk like beast man and why Doctor Octopus is a woman in this time-line. Then a few things they don’t explain, for example, who this new Doctor Octopus is in relation to the original one.

The really good part about this film, they nailed Miles Morales in several ways. As a character he’s phenomenally well done and they really get down a lot of his back story, especially how close he is with his uncle Aaron, played by Mahershala Ali.

This film has a tremendous cast. There are several amazing actors in this film, including Liev Schreiber and Chris Pine has a small role as the Ultimate Universes, Peter Parker, he actually does a pretty decent job with it and manages to disguise his voice pretty well. Jake Johnson then comes in to be the new Peter Parker and plays a more out of shape version, with his life going a bit upside down after divorcing Mary Jane. Be thankful they didn’t reference to stupidity of one more day in this film, there is a joke that only Marvel Comic fans are going to get.

Yeah, one negative I will say about this film, it doesn’t introduce people to a lot of the concepts of these various Marvel Universes too well. It’s made largely more comedic to be played to a younger crowd, but sadly I think it comes at the expense of some of the characters. I know it’s supposed to be Miles Morales story, but it could have gone a bit more into Spider-Gwen given how much of an expanded role she has in this film. But if this film makes people go out and buy the comic series then I’m certainly glad for it.

One thing that really doesn’t work in this film, it’s kind of the animation. The animation’s actually really well designed, it really does look like a comic that’s come to life. The problem is I don’t know how much of this was designed to be seen on a big screen. Maybe it was the cinema I was in but, I noticed quite a lot of times in the early portions of the film that it did not look like it fit the big screen very well. This film does look like it was really supposed to be straight to Netflix production, but ended up getting a last minute big screen release.

What it doesn’t skip however is the action scenes. They are done really damn well, and do a good job of portraying what you expect in a Spider-Man story.

The thing that I really liked about this film however, was the fact that it’s very clear, everyone involved in this film clearly had a real love and respect for Spider-Man. But also managed to do a pretty good job of creating that homage and telling its well done story.

Some of the jokes really hit, this is hardly surprising seeing as the screenplay was by Phil Lord, was a writer on Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs and The Lego Movie, if you are familiar with those films you know exactly the kind of humour to expect here. He does do a good job of writing a humorous story line here, Although the funniest is Nicholas Cage as Spider-Man Noir who is just Nicholas Cage at his best, he runs away with the role.

I could nit-pick a few things. Such as the fact this film was done much better in the comics. The story-line does try to cram a bit too much in to a short space of time, but it never feels like it out stays its welcome. I do think there is a few too many villains in the film, seriously there is so many, you’ve got; the Green Goblin, Kingpin, Doctor Octopus, Tomb Stone, The Prowler, Scorpion and some of them feel really wasted. They at least did a good job of Kingpin and his motivations in this film were understandable, and part of his back story will be familiar to anyone who’s seen the Netflix Dare Devil series.

However, with everything being said, I came out enjoying this film. It’s a nice simple distraction and it does a really good job of Mile Morales some exposure and its held by Shameik Moore’s excellent portrayal of the character. However, it does still feel like a distraction, since this has come out at the same time as the PlayStation 4 Spider-Man game, which told an absolutely fantastic Spider-Man story, that many have said is better than most of the film, and I would have to agree. In fact, the timing of this film couldn’t have been worse in that regard.

As good as this film is, it doesn’t really hold a candle to the plot of the game and it’s a shame really because I think that the timing of its release is the ultimate downfall.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is a film that gives Marvel some exposure but I think it’s just a hold over film until the next big Marvel movie comes out. Especially with us getting another Spider-Man movie next year with Spider-Man: Far from Home. The film has some decent comedy and I would urge people to give it a go. Just don’t go with any expectations of it being on the same dramatic level as the other Spider-Man films or the recent PlayStation 4 video game. I will stress though Spider-Verses’ good points really outweigh its bad.

Well that’s another week down, and I’m only part way through my two superhero movies getting released. Next week I am seeing the latest in the extended DC Universe with Aqua-Man.

“CREED II”

Creed II is the latest film in the Rocky franchise, which is now on its eighth film. The franchise rebooted two years ago, with a new main character, Adonis Creed son of first film antagonist Apollo Creed. If you recall my review of that film I really enjoyed Creed and I thought it was a breath of fresh air for the franchise. I was looking forward to seeing how this would work going forward. Now we are two years down the line, and Creeds success has sporned a sequel.

The major difference being that this time director Ryan Coogler is no longer on the project as he was off directing Black Panther. So, in his place we have director Steven Caple Jr. I had heard good things, according to IMDB he is most known for films called The Land and A Different Tree, neither of which I have seen.

What’s more, Sylvester Stallone is keeping a firm grip on the franchise by co-writing the screenplay. This time he is also joined by Juel Taylor. He hasn’t developed the story though, that was done by a team of Sascha Penn and Cheo Hodari Coker. The latter of which was producer for the Netflix series Luke Cage.

So here we are, two years down the line. Not only does this film have to continue the Rocky story, it has to follow on from other entries in the franchise. Creed was very good in the sense it doesn’t tie back to too many of the other films, but it does have a sort of connection with them. As we got from the trailers, this will be the first time there is a bridge between them.

Ok, Creed II is set only a few years after the events of the first Creed film. Though it is also under the assumption that you have seen the film Rocky 4. If you don’t know which one I’m on about, it’s the one that went a bit wacky, ??? got a robot for his birthday and we had the whole Russia V America boxing match, which SPOILER ALERT resulted in Apollo Creed’s death to the hands of the soviet boxer, Ivan Drago.

This film takes place after Adonis Creed, played by Michael B Jordan has gained the heavyweight championship and for his first title defence he’s got into a grudge match with Ivan Drago, reprised in his role by Dolph Lundgren and Dragos son Viktor, played by Florian Munteanu. The film results in Rocky, played once again by Sylvester Stallone, backing away from training him because he is worried of history repeating itself.

This film doesn’t sound like it’s very complicated, or even that long of a film. But god it is long. This films 2 hours and 10 minutes, but luckily this film flies by. There is not too much of that usual themes these Rocky films have of, I don’t want you to fight, but I will end up supporting you in the end of the film. There is certainly an element of that, as I mentioned Rocky has now become a weird mix of Adrian Mickey since he is kind of in this position of not making the same mistakes he did. That’s a very core theme of this film, it’s about passing on the torch in a sense, should it mimic the previous ones or should it learn from the mistakes of the previous.

There are all sorts of sub plots surrounding that, there is a whole factor of him not seeing his son in quite a long time and trying to get back in contact. There is the fact that Adonis and his new wife Bianca, who you may remember from the previous film, played by Tessa Thompson, are having a child. There is also the whole factor that Ivan still blames Rocky for what happened, he lost everything and he looks a lot more dishevelled this time round.

Dolph Lundgren really plays Ivan like a broken man which is kind of ironic considering that one of the few things he actually said in the original Rocky 4 was ‘I must break you’, something he does not refrain from saying in parts of this film. Abonnement issues are definitely something between Ivan and Viktor who have had everything taken away from them and are trying to reclaim it. However, their sub plot feels rather under-developed, that’s the real negative I will say about Creed II. A couple of the side characters feel ferally under-developed, most notably Ivan and Viktor. Their sub-plot could be more, the same as with Bianca, who’s sub-plot might well have been cut.

The only other negative I can say about this film, there’s nothing like the one shot boxing fight that we saw in the first film. There is no impressive moment like that. It does feel like this film is dragging its heels a couple of times. But dear god Creed II is well written. While a few sub-plots may feel underwritten, they’re not non-existent and they work very well. The boxing scenes that have made it into the film are really well done.

Once again, the antagonist, Viktor, is played by an actual real Romanian boxer Florian ‘Big Nasty’ Munteanu. He definitely fits the role to be Ivan Drago’s son, since he towers above Michael B Jordan. What surprised me even more was that he can actually act in a sense. He doesn’t get too many scenes to do stuff in and his dialogue is fairly limited (like father, like son) but he certainly stands out in the film a lot more than Tony Bello from the previous film who was less of an antagonist and more of a final opponent. I actually like the fact they brought back an antagonisticall edge to the boxer, but they haven’t lost the sense of down to earth realism the previous film had.

I mentioned in the previous film that it felt weird to go back to down to earth realism, considering how out there Rocky 4 was, which was more evident this time round. Since this film draws directly parallel to Rocky 4. It’s a bit weird to think that Ivan Drago was this sort of super boxer that had been enhanced from technology, and he basically could fit in with the cast of Street Fighter. Which frankly kind of contrasts with the tone set by these films.

To be fair Dolph Lundgren in this film gets to act a lot more than he has in previous films. It does still seem a bit weird that a Swedish guy and a Romanian guy are both playing Russians, but there you go.

In fact, this whole film has tonnes of performances that could easily be nominated for Oscars. The lead and supporting actors, this includes Tessa Thompson who wants to get knocked out the park, as well as Michael B Jordan who I think after this time won’t miss out on a best Oscar nomination. Sylvester Stallone once again as Rocky I suspect won’t receive an Oscar nomination this time round. I wouldn’t even object to Dolph Lundgren receiving a nomination for receiving best supporting actor at this point. It would also be remissive if I didn’t mention Phylicia Rashad, who gets a lot more of an expanded role in this performance.

Most of what you like about Rocky is here, including the obvious training montages, but would you really want one of these films without those. Much like the previous Creed film there is a lot of a new sense to it, not just from the hip-hop soundtrack, which apart from the closing credits was one of my favourites. It does suit the film really well and they enjoy it.

If there is anything else to say about this film, when someone gets hurt you really feel it and it’s a credit to how well the fights are choreographed. I think this film will do a lot more for the older Rocky fans since it tries to capture a lot more of their nostalgia. This being said, it is not at expense of the new audience.

Creed II is a phenomenal piece of work. It builds off the first one expertly and is ferally cathartic after my last couple of reviews, seeing as I’ve gone from last week, reviewing one of the worst films from 2018, to one of the best films I’ve seen in 2018. The performances are beyond excellent and it does a really good job of tying the Creed movies to the Rocky movies. With some excellent performances, the majority of which are Oscar worthy.

If you have any interest, please see this film while it is in cinemas. It’s a phenomenal film that you really must see and I urge you to check it out.

Right, I did promise a mini review of Wreck It Ralph 2 and here it is.

Well, that’s it from me this week. I will be reviewing the first in the series of 2 superhero films. Firstly, I will be looking into Spiderman: into the Spider verse.

“ROBIN HOOD (2018)”

What is it with Robin Hood films never quite working? Aside from the Disney one I’ve never heard of one that’s received no source of criticism. In fact, the one probably with the biggest cult status at this point is the film starring Kevin Cosner??? That being said it’s been quite a while since we have had a Robin Hood film, the last one being that film starring Russell Crowe??? from 2010. A film I have actually commented on before saying I wasn’t a fan of. But now in 2018 we have another one out.

Don’t bother looking at the writers, I couldn’t find anything they had done prior to this. This time we have the director Otto Bathurst, if you haven’t heard of him, that’s because he hasn’t directed any films prior to this. He is a TV director. Directing a few episodes of Peaky Blinders as well as one episode of Black Mirror, if you’re curious, it is the episode titled National Anthem.

Ok, I went to this film thinking that I might get something interesting. I was sadly, sadly mistaken. Robin Hood of Loxley, played by Taron Egerton crusades, but is then later sent home after declining an order. When he gets home the Sherriff of Nottingham, played by Ben Mendelsohn (who seems to always want to be the villain) has closed all his property and is drying up the taxes through the roof. Not to mention his fiancée Marian, played by Eve Hewson, has believed him to be dead so as a result has moved on and married Will Scarlet, played by Jamie Dornan. With nothing left to lose he’s taken up training with a man who followed him home, named Little John, played by Jamie Foxx after freeing him and saving his son during the process of the crusade. Now Robin- or Rob as he is constantly referred to in this film because the film thinks it’s gangster or something like that… has to steal from the Sheriff and give back to the people, whilst also getting in his good graces as a lord to try and find where the money is coming in for this supposed war effort.

I didn’t go to Robin Hood with too much expectation, but dear God, it’s no secret. Robin Hood is one of the most ineptly made films of the year! I am staggered that this film is as bad as it is. Everything’s all over the place. The action scenes are appallingly shot, the direction is non-existent, the actors are giving terrible performances- none of them believable, and this film has absolutely no idea what it wants to be. It’s clearly not a historical one, they threw that out the window, not to mention the costume designs have absolutely no period accuracy. In fact, it was so bad that my house mate actually believed the film was a modern re-interpretation, and was shocked when I informed him it was actually taking place in the time of Robin Hood.

Everything about the film feels completely out of place. The direction of this film clearly has a fetish for open fire, because there are tonnes of scenes with fire in them. Especially fire bursting out for no good reason. Not to mention the way the fire crossbows and arrows, making it look like a trailer for a Call of Duty game.

The film also seems to want to turn Robin Hood into a Super Hero, because everything has to be a Super Hero film now. Not helped by the fact that the costume for Robin Hood is going to be very familiar to anyone who is a fan of the series Arrow. In fact, it looks so much like that, from just the trailer alone, it wouldn’t surprise me if DC comics tried to sue them.

Lionsgate is the studio bank rolling the film and between this and Power Rangers, it is very clear they are trying to start some more franchises to compete with Marvel. But with Power Rangers failing at the Box Office and this likely to do the same.

Taron Egerton is the only one really putting his all into this. It actually shows he is pretty decent all things considered. His character though is just so bland and boring, but you could just replace the actor with anyone, same with all the characters.

Little John for example is so weird. He is basically the trainer character. He genuinely does have a few bad ass moments but not really enough to warrant a good actor like himself in this role. In fact, it definitely seemed like they were borrowing quite a bit from Morgan Freemans character, in Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, and the more you borrow from that film, the better off you will be. Yeah, I actually liked the Kevin ??? Film, it’s deliciously camp.

If you are expecting any of the other famous merry men in this film, sad to say they are not really in this film. The only one really that I can mention is Friar Tuck who is played by Tim Minchin, just another one of the odd casting choices for the film. His accent in Nottinghamshire stands out so much, you’ve got to wonder what the hell they were thinking. It is again another waste of a talented person. Not to mention that Jamie Dornan seems to be really out of his element and the script fails him more than anyone else and you can see where the arc is going from a mile away. In a better film he would have been one of the best parts of it, unfortunately it’s squandered and that’s just with going ‘oh, it’s that guy from 50 shades of grey’, and after that series is fully done, I’m amazed anyone even has a career.

This film is shot appallingly. This is one of the worst shot films I have seen all year. The cuts are terrible, it reminded me very much of that Assassins Creed movie I reviewed, in that I was struggling to spot any shot that lasted longer than 5 seconds. The film is shot and edited like a trailer. This is even more shocking when you consider that it was actual archery used in the film. The directors hired actual archery experts to train the actors, but they’re wasted in this film because the shots don’t allow for us to see the skill involved. Not to mention that half the arrows are fricking CG! What is the point of hiring experts to train your actors, when half your film’s going to be computer generated anyway. If you haven’t suspected, much like the set, these special effects are laughable.

I’m not going to lie; Robin Hood was a difficult one to get through. I sat through this film and by the time I got out to the Black Friday sales, I realised I had lost 2 hours of my life to this film and lost out on purchasing Dark Souls Remastered for £10, which for those not in the know is a frigging bargain for a massive game. Just so I could see the film on time. So, forgive me if I’m a bit salty about it.

All joking aside, this film really is genuinely one of the worst films I have seen all year. It is appalling in every sense of the word. It borrows from several action clichés and it seems like they borrowed a lot from Guy Ritchie’s, King Arthur Legend of the Sword, which this film reminded me of quite heavily. Much like that film, this one is laughably bad. It has no historical accuracy so there is no point going for that, and it is not even that fun. The film doesn’t really embrace its ridiculousness, it tries to act very serious.

My god is it bad in every sense of the word. The acting is appalling, the film has no direction whatsoever and is forced to go into several different parts. The dialogue is atrocious and because of the cinematography and special effects it is barely watchable.

The fact that everyone who went to the cinema when I saw this stayed in there is amazing to me. I wanted to leave so many times. The film is so generic that it’s actually boring. This is such a boring movie. Save your money, there are a lot better films coming out in December. The amount of money you would’ve put forward to this ticket, you can now buy a really great Christmas gift for someone, or just do something nice for your day. And obviously your ticket would help fund a sequel to this tripe, which the ending of the film actually teases. Thanks.

“FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE CRIMES OF GRINDELWALD”

Ok I reviewed Fantastic Beasts a couple of years ago, I didn’t review it too well if you recall. I didn’t say it was a bad film, in fact if anything I thought it was a good film, but it wasn’t as great as many people made it out to be. I also confirmed at the end of that review that the sequel had already been confirmed, and well here we are. I personally didn’t see the need for a sequel since the story was pretty conclusive and it would probably benefit more if they had done another sort of story, but all things considered, it wasn’t a totally terrible idea.

The film once again is written by J.K. Rowling herself and is directed by David Yates who has been the pretty consistent Harry Potter director since Order of the Phoenix. Now David Yates is not a bad director, I think he was the right director to helm the final few Harry Potter films, but his success outside of Potter has been rather mixed. In fact, I actually reviewed his Tarzan reboot which I thought was mediocre at best.

I have discussed my thoughts on Harry Potter in the past, in case you are unaware, I am not the hugest fan of Harry Potter but it has some good qualities.

The Crimes of Grindelwald is a plot that takes place just as soon after the first Fantastic Beasts. Grindelwald played by Johnny Depp has broken out of his captivity from America and has made his way to Europe, more specifically he’s gone to Paris. Newt Scamander, after his run in, in New York aka the last movie, played once again by Eddie Redmayne has been banned from international travel, unless he joins a ministry of magic which he has since refused. Albus Dumbledore, played by Jude Law, has requested to go and deal with Grindelwald, and after finding out that the sisters from the previous film are both in Paris decides to take Dumbledore up on his offer.

How do I put this…? I wasn’t a big fan of the first Fantastic Beasts film, but man is the second one just a slog to get through. I’m not joking, this is probably one of the most ill-conceived projects in the Harry Potter cannon to date and its only just shy of The Cursed Child in that regard.

Ok, things I did like about this film. The dialogue is still just as good as the last time. Other than that, there is some decent plot lines and the final act is actually damn impressive, however, this is also where the plots going completely off the rails.

First off there is way too many and I mean WAY too many characters returning from the first Fantastic Beasts, some of them with no real reason. Considering how controversial it was to keep Johnny Depp in. the franchise at this time, you’d think they would actually have a good reason for Grindelwald to still be a part of the film franchise, but god is his role flat here. It seems like his character has changed motivations between films. In the previous film he was pretty much a dark wizard out for power, in this one he’s sort of become this sort of wizardry world, Donald Trump style, cult leader and sort of prototype Voldemort. I suspect Rowling is, in the long run, trying to suggest that Grindelwald and his ideology is a pre-curse to Voldemort, but it kind of fails.

The film also brings back characters who have had their plot lines entirely covered. Dan Fogler’s character Jacob is back, who you may remember as the muggle who discovers the wizarding world. He has no reason to be in this film, other than, he’s someone for Newt to talk too. He doesn’t really provide much relevancy apart from some weird sub plot that him and Queenie can’t get married because of some law at this time that forbids muggles, and wizards and witches from getting married. That obviously clearly worked itself out seeing as Hermione’s’ parents are both muggles. The film tries to frame it as if Queenie kind of has a point that Jacob is not stepping up, but he has a valid reason to be worried for her.

Tina Goldstein is back, played by Katherine Waterston again and her role is, well, kind of pointless. The only reason she seems to be in this film is because Ezra Millers character, Credence Barebone, is back, yeah, he somehow survived the last film… Don’t ask me how! And it seems like the film doesn’t want to give an answer to that. His character plot is the most baffling. There is so much time and effort put into his character in this film, that makes absolutely no sense . How did he get to Paris? Last time we checked he was in New York. It’s pretty difficult to transport people there without anyone noticing.

Not to mention the film has to add a lot of new characters and give them parts to play in the storyline. The only one that isn’t really designed to link to the Harry Potter universe as a whole is Newts brother, Theseus, played by Callum Turner who is marrying one of the Lestrange family, Leta, played by Zoe Kravitz who gets an arc of her own in the film. This sets up a decent mystery, but with a kind of poor pay off, which actually come to think of it is this film in a nutshell. Her arc takes up a tonne of time in the last part of this film.

Plus, if you cane to this film thinking you were going to see a lot more of young Dumbledore, erm I wouldn’t get your hopes up. Dumbledore is barely in the film, I think he’s only in the film for like 20 minutes. This film has a run time of 2 hours and 14 minutes, and much like the first film, it out stays its welcome.

Seriously, what is up with the structuring of this film. As I mentioned before it kind of wants to tie itself to the Potter films as a whole, but it actually kind of contradicts itself quite a bit. I’m not sure Rowling is fully aware of all the changes made from book to film, since the two are now starting to contradict each other. For example, Dumbledore makes a big deal about his sister in this film. Now there was a big deal and big explanation about this in the book, but the film version didn’t put as much emphasis on it. Now she does actually give a decent explanation to why Dumbledore and Grindelwald can’t fight each other. I say somewhat decent, its actually full of quite a few flaws but it at least attempts an explanation, rather than the whole, well I’m not in a position to do anything, that I was afraid they were going with.

This films plot structure is just the worst. This film is basically a middle act. I’ll say one thing about Rowling. Rowling is a good writer, but she doesn’t really do a good job of cliff hangers. This has a lot of the same problems as The Half Blood Prince had. Whereas that film was also entirely a middle act with no main end act, there was at least leading to something impactful. Crimes of Grindelwald doesn’t have that luxury. There is only so many places it can actually go, and they would all have to lead back to the events of Harry Potter. Again, it can’t be that close because the film’s set several decades before the events of those books. The film is juggling so many plots all at once, and Newt doesn’t have reason to be in that many of them.

I mean I’ll give some credit to Fantastic Beasts, at least Newt had a reason to stick around for most of that film. This one really kind if forced them into the plot. While the climax to this film is pretty good, it also takes so many leaps in logic, even for a film around wizards.

The performances are still actually alright, again I have to particularly comment on Eddie Redmayne and Dan Fogler who have excellent chemistry. Zoe Kravitz does a pretty good job playing Leta. The real one that everyone wants to know about is Jude Law as Dumbledore, taking on a role that had previously been played by Alec Guinness and Michael Gambon. He does kind of have some of the air of Michael Gambon, and a few of his book qualities, blurring the line between the two continuities. What I mean by that is a lot of his boisterous nature that didn’t quite make it into the film versions is kind of a bit more present and Jude Law is doing his best. The problem is the script doesn’t give him much to work with.

Oh, and in case anyone’s asking, they do make some reference to the fact Dumbledore is now a known LGBT character, but it really doesn’t play much significant’s to the plot. I just thought I would actually mention it so that no one asks me why I didn’t mention it. Honestly you could have probably taken it out of the plot and it wouldn’t have made much difference.

The designs of the beasts are alright, but I’m noticing the marketing more and more with them since the beasts make a comeback. More specifically, the ones that can be sold as toys. This film definitely feels as though it has been hampered by the marketing.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is a sequel that really didn’t do much for me, and it’s a sequel to a film I didn’t have much enjoyment for in the first place. Everything about the film is rather middling to boring and it is a film that never really excited me, and has terrible plot structure which leaves the film juggling too much, most of which was already resolved in the first film, but is needlessly dragged back to sell the film to more of an audience. It is rather ultimately an example of the mediocrity levels which have been reached by several films now, with various studios trying to imitate the success of the Marvel cinematic universe.

The film is saved by some good performances and some alright intrigue, and there are a few little nods to Harry Potter law that will appease the Potter heads. But this is frankly a film I don’t think is going to satisfy anyone.

The film has built to a sequel, meaning this is going to be a trilogy of films. But man, the next film had better improve a lot of its latest faults.

Right next week I had a difficult choice. I had to choose between The Girl in the Spiders web, or the new Robin Hood adaptation. You’ll forgive me that I chose Robin Hood. However, the week after I have a genuine crisis, as there are two films I really want to review. So, I need your help, what would you rather see me review? Creed 2 or Wreck it Ralph 2, Ralph Breaks the Internet. I would genuinely like to know what you thin k would make a better review.