Mortal Kombat 2: The Next Level

Summary: after surviving the assassination attempts in the first film Earth Realms fighters head to the Mortal Kombat tournament to determine the fate of Earth Realm.

First things first, we’ve seen some people on the right call this a bait and switch film or a girl boss film. They say this as Kitana is positioned as a prominent new character, however, the idea that she is the central character over Johnny Cage simply isn’t true. Rather than being a bait and switch narrative both Kitana and Johnny have parallel but interconnected heroes journeys. Both are vital to defeat Shao Khan at the end of the film.

The new characters, Jade, Kitana, Sindel, Johnny, Baraka are a mixed bag. Jade feels very one note and Tati Gabrielle cannot act to save her life, Sindel is barely in the film, and the choice to make Baraka a comedic support character is a bad idea. However, Karl Urban is great as Johnny Cage, and Adeline Rudolph is both emotive but also badass as Kitana. They will both be welcome additions to the roster going forward.

The fights are good for the most part though perhaps a little less impressive than the first film. The one thing that we would have preferred the film do which it doesn’t is make the deaths more permanent, yes you can have the zombie forms of the characters but to just bring back Kano so quickly seems a bit of a cop out. In the games they have to bring back the main characters game after game but here you could have let them die and then bring in other characters from across the rosters, there are more than enough.

Overall, a great popcorn film and if you like the games you’ll get a lot out of it.

4.5/5

Pros.

Lots of gore and fatalities

The new characters like Johnny and Kitana

The direction the series is heading in with annihilation seemingly the next port of call

The commitment to honour and reference the games

Seeing the Netherrealm.

Cons.

Jade, Baraka and Sindle are not well implemented.

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Punisher One More Kill: A Fear of Gareth Ennis

Summary: The MCU tried to adapt Welcome Back, Frank and does what it always does.

This is why the MCU can’t make a Blade film, sometimes people just want to see badass characters being badass, not processing trauma, not having a crying, just being cool. You’re making a comic book film/made for streaming one shot, for God sake.

The first half of this is Frank being sad, the amount of time wasted herein becomes more and more noticeable later.

The second half tries to give the people what they want but then just abruptly ends with no how do you do, to maybe be picked up in Spiderman Brand New Day.

John Wick understands the badass factor, Mortal Kombat understands the badass factor, the MCU is allergic.

Plus as has been memed heavily since there is a God awful CGI shot of Frank falling, wherein they swap the stuntman’s face with John’s and my my it looks terrible.

Overall, it’s about twenty minutes of goodness wrapped in 30 minutes of disappointment.

Pros.

Some cool Punisher action

It leaves you wanting more of the good bits

Cons

The sad Frank sequences

The ending

The CGI

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Rose of Nevada: A Very British Mystery

We were present at the BFI in 2025, wherein they showed this film, we then shelved this write up until the film was going to release wide which it is about to. -Editor note.

Possibly one of the best British mystery films ever made or certainly one of the best of modern memory. From the outset you can tell there is something not quite right about the world the film is in. It is hard to put your finger on quite what it is but you know when the ghost boat shows up that things are in motion.

The idea of the phantom passage of time and how the boat manages to take them back in time possibly in a loop fashion with the same events having to play out, or possibly with the idea of the characters morphing into these figures from the past is very interesting.

The high point for sure is the sound track and the use of sound with the idea of the sound existing in a liminal sense wherein it is not always synched up creating an uncanny quality that really adds to the atmosphere.

Overall, a wonderfully creative and imaginative horror film that does a lot to create chills that feel more existential than most films.

4.5/5

Pros.

The mystery

The sound design

The cinematography

The atmosphere

The scares

Cons.

Minor pacing issues

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Cinema Issue: TDS And The Boys

Straight off the bat the Boys isn’t anything like the fantastic graphic novel in any way, that was the first sign of things to come. The graphic novel had something to say this show is the safety most made by committee thing ever.

However, the thing that really began the terminal decline of the boys was when Eric Kripke decided to make it about his dislike of Trump. Homelander in the comics was never supposed to be a stand in for Trump, yet in the TV show it is pretty damn clear. Every week a old political event from serval years ago is trotted out, now done by Homelander, with the writing going you should be outraged.

The more and more the show has felt the need to fight the culture war the worse it has got. At least in the beginning they hit both sides but as the show went on it just went one way.

Even the fans that cheered on every Trump parallel and thought oh it was so timely are starting to call it out. A one trick pony becomes clear to everyone in the end . The final season so far is hated by many fans as they are starting to see it for what it is.

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Hokum: Americans Hated Abroad

A writer, a murder and a witch.

The lead in this film may well get a trophy for the most unpleasant protagonist of recent rememberance he is horrible to everyone around him, and is only nice to the young bartender as he wants her.

After she dies and the witch stuff starts to happen you don’t really believe that he cares about her enough to investigate her death or do any of that.

There is some great horror visuals within this section and it is nice to see it lean into Irish mythology however it doesn’t go far enough you get just a little bit and then it ends, it’s very disappointing in that regard.

Overall, an oddly stunted horror film that has some good ideas but doesn’t go far enough to make them meaningful.

2/5.

Pros.

A few good scares

The Irish mythology

Cons.

The lead is just awful

There is filler in it

The ending doesn’t feel like food closure

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Cinema Issues The Death Of DC

In this edition of Cinema Issues we will be discussing the state of DC, in terms of films and tv shows.

When the new Gunn lead DC was announced immediately after the previous DCEU failed attempts were made to win fans back however it has been a series of large scale mistakes that have hurt this universe to the point where it could be rebooted once again in the near future.

Firstly, announcing the slate so far in advance was an error, it made it look like they were trying to copy Marvel it also allowed everyone to see each time they missed a deadline for a film and then that to influence the narrative. As was the case with the Authority.

Secondly the focus on characters has been wrong, of you wanted to do something interesting you could have focused on characters that had not been adapted before. However they went straight for Superman, it appeared they were going for all the old favourites, however, then they neglected to make a Batman film.

Thirdly the new universe is inherently confusing. As certain elements of the old DCEU carry over it becomes unclear what is canon and what isn’t. What is the fate of Blue Beetle?

Fourthly is the fact that James Gunn is the wrong man for the job. He does odd ball well, he could have been good for a Creature Commandos or Doom Patrol, but Superman? He just didn’t get it, and the film underperformed. There is also the ego issue, Gunn seems to have developed megalomania, he named the Justice Gang after his own initials, he debated taking on a Stan Lee like role in the DCEU, he got himself animated into the Creature Commandos logo and he puts his wife in everything. The DCUs fascination with Krypto who here is based on Gunn’s own dog is just another example.

Finally you have the fact it has already gone negative. Think about the MCU at its peak, did it attack the audience and call them names? No that came later as the cracks emerged. We are a TV series and a film into Gunn’s DCU and we already have stars attacking fans with Milly Alcock deciding to consistently bad mouth men.

Supergirl does not look like it will do well, Lanterns has already angered fans by viewing the Green part of the name as dumb, and Clayface who the hell cares.

The DCU has half its hull missing and is sinking, what we are seeing now is the final attempts to save the doomed ship.

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Cinema Issues: Angel Studios Sells Out

Angel Studios knows who their audience is, when they first came about they were anti Hollywood, they stood for something, they were independent.

Now they are putting mentally ill men who think they’re women into their films, and taking potshots at capitalism, all to attract talent like Seth Rogen and one of the kids from Stranger Things.

The funny thing was the left would not touch any of their films due to the associations they keep, and now they have alienated the only audience they ever had. There is even some talk that the folks over there called the audience pigs.

The next time they want to make a film like Sound of Freedom they won’t find anyone willing to support them now.

The fact is they are adapting a book all about the evils of communism whilst then flipping that and saying well actually capitalism is worse.

This might be the biggest self inflicted mortal blow any studio has ever performed.

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Something Very Bad Is Going To Happen: The Name Says It All

A new horror series from some of the people who brought you Stranger Things.

One only needs watch the first ten minutes of this to see where it is going, and to see that it is generic. Sadly we had to sit and watch it to the end and yup it goes exactly where you would expect a modern horror series to go.

From the way the couple act you can tell they are going to be insufferable, they are stereotypical millennial or Gen Z adults, listening to true crime as they drive, overly crude and of course nursing some deep seated trauma that they spend every second stewing in.

The broader horror of the show is all about marriage and how ultimately you shouldn’t do it. It deconstructs traditional ideas about relationships and turns them into horror. As we have seen that before, the idea of subverting traditional ideas about relationships just shows how screwed up Hollywood is and how it really doesn’t even understand basic human interactions anymore.

The kindest way to describe this is Netflix slop, you will likely see about 20 other series and films just like this on the streamer if you watch it.

Overall, just bland and dull.

0.5/5

Pros.

At least it’s not more episodes

Cons.

The characters are awful

Its subversion and commentary are played out

It isn’t scary

Its incredibly generic

It is badly paced

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The Wizard of the Kremlin: The Best Film You Haven’t Seen This Year

Summary: The rise to power of Vladimir Putin.

This film is gripping, it uses a fictional format to explore real events in Russian history to talk about the inner workings of power there. To some it may be a little slow but if you care about geopolitics there is more than enough to make the film worth the watch, there was even the thought of wanting it to slow down and do more, there were events and periods it didn’t really cover such as the wars in Georgia and Ukraine.

Additionally it would have been better to not have everyone speaking English and to have the film be in Russian for the most part. Dano’s character could still narrate the story in English but the character interactions wouldn’t be in it, it would make the film feel more authentic.

Overall, a brilliant film.

5/5

Pros.

It is interesting

It merges the fictional and the real very well

You want more of it

The performances

It doesn’t treat it’s characters as 2 dimensional.

Cons.

The English accents are jarring at first

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Cinema Issues: Folks Are Realising Star Wars Is Dead

The projections for the Mandalorian and Grogu is that it will open to 80 million dollars worldwide on its opening weekend. Which for a film of it’s size and with the brand behind it is dire. Likely this is why Kathleen left earlier this year as she didn’t want this to on her, but it is.

This is a result of treating your fans like crap for years, and for constantly attacking them from creatives down to actors. For goodness sake the man playing the Mandalorian hates half the American public and compared them to the KKK. It is a result of not making films for them and instead making films for a group of people who don’t like Star Wars and likely never will.

It will be very interesting to see where this goes if it does open as low as people say. One would imagine heads would need to roll immediately, as someone who lives not too far from Galaxies Edge it is becoming clearer and clearer that the brand is dying and quickly at that.

They need to listen to the fans they called toxic for so many years, they need to cancel everything if this fails and start over with a new slate of films and shows.

Star Wars can be saved but it needs drastic intervention soon.

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