Loki: The Variant

3.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

So, the second episode of Loki is good, there is no doubting that, however it does slump a bit when compared to last weeks mostly stellar opener. Mainly this is due to what I would argue is a rushed story decision on the part of the episode’s ending, but I can see why with a limited six episode run they chose to do it this way.

I am of course talking about Loki’s decision to chase after his evil variant and effectively leave the TVA. Like I said plot wise it makes sense, but I would have liked more time with the Loki and Mobius buddy cop dynamic, Owen Wilson and Tom Hiddleston have great chemistry together- hopefully they will still get to share a lot of scenes together.

As for the who the internet have dubbed prematurely Lady Loki, who is more likely Enchantress, it is far to early to cast any kind of judgement on her: though I will say it was a neat development to have it be her that truly begins the destruction of the Sacred Timeline it makes her vital to the narrative going forward.

Overall, a solid episode though one that is slightly in the shadow of its better predecessor.

Pros.

Loki and Mobius

A few very funny scenes

The destruction of the timeline

The things it sets up

Cons.

The plot feels a little rushed

It underwhelms after a strong first episode

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Thor: Natalie Portman’s Second On Screen Stilted Relationship

3.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I am seemingly one of the few people that actually seem to like the first Thor film. I don’t mind the Shakespeare esque dialogue, or the forced romance between Hemsworth and Portman where both look like they hate each other; instead I actually enjoy it.

Firstly yes it is widely known and widely mocked that the chemistry between Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman was not there during this film, however, I actually quite like them together on screen as a pair I think they work well together and could have been a lot more. Maybe Thor 4 can fix it.

I also think though not as zany as in his more recent appearances Thor is still a very likeable lead character and Hemsworth is very charismatic. I like the unworthy arc and the fish out of water style comedy, both work for me. Moreover, I appreciate the family drama between Thor, Odin and Loki I think it works well and makes for one of the best endings in the MCU. Try and tell me watching Loki float away into the void didn’t make you sad.

I also think that Lady Sif and the Warriors Three have huge potential in this film, sadly Marvel seems content on doing nothing with them. What a waste.

Overall, one of the better early MCU films that often gets overlooked in favor of Ragnarök and though I love Taika Waititi as much as the next guy, this film has a lot of stuff going for it as well.

Pros.

Hemsworth

Portman

Sif and The Warriors Three

Cons.

Darcy

A slow start

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The Waterman: As Dry As The Deseret

1.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I feel like this film views itself as whimsical, and as using the fantasy nature of its story to actually tackle hard hitting issues but in a wonderous way; however, to me it just seems hollow. I find a good comparison for this film would be to A Monster Calls, they are similar in many ways with the key different here being that The Water Man has no soul.

This is a shame as the film desperately tries to create one, playing up the emotional impact of a lot of scenes to try and further the effect of fairly weak writing. In the end the film feels overly sentimental rather than impactful, with it entirely not understanding how to connect with audiences.

The one thing I will give this film props for however is the acting. I thought Rosario Dawson, and David Oyelowo were both strong and the child lead was bearable, which is saying a lot for a child actor.

Overall, you can see what this film was trying to do, but it just doesn’t seem to understand how to play with an audience’s heart strings creating in the end a film that feels both soulless and hollow, whilst also feeling overly sentimental.

Pros.

The acting

The fantasy elements are interesting

Cons.

The emotions are all wrong

A lot of the fantasy stuff is underdeveloped

The pacing

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Cruella: When Is This Film Set Does Anyone Know ? PS. That Is Not The Seventies

2.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Disney’s live action remakes will never get any love from me: they are an effort in baiting nostalgia and milking the past to make up for modern day creative failings- worse yet it seems to be working for them. Anyway, I went into this film with low expectations, the trailers didn’t inspire hope, however, after watching it I find myself mixed.

The biggest pro I can give this film is for Emma Stone’s performance. Stone manages to lose herself in the role, and truly become the character. I liked the fact that they didn’t go out of their way to make her sympathetic or even likeable most of the time, with that helping her feel more villainous and more like the character we would later come to know.

However, that is where the pros for the film grind to a halt. My biggest issue with this film was its style. From a design perspective this film is schizophrenic never really being able to decide what tone or even era it was going for- it is jarringly off putting.

Moreover, the plot and story of the film are laughably far fetch, with the film giving up on trying to explain itself midway through, thus creating so many plot holes that you begin to lose count.

Finally, there are plenty of characters in this narrative that serve no purpose and are redundant. Case in point Cruella’s childhood friend/reporter, who’s whole character arc is that she follows Cruella around and takes pictures; she has no character beyond that, nor does she have a need to be in this film at all.

Overall, not worth the price of admission wait until it is free on Disney +

Pros.

Emma Stone

Mark Strong

Cons.

The odd tone

The inconsistencies

The era/ and the fact the film can’t decide when it wants to be set

The logic

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Hop: So It Has Come To This

Hop

1.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

So my search for wholesome films to watch has brought me to this, my desperation is showing. I had heard nothing but bad things about this film, and yet I thought how bad can it be? Well, buckle up.

Firstly this film made me pine for the cookie cutter safe family films of Disney, where even the word ‘crud’ is probably a bit too strong. This should be a red flag to you, and it is not said without merit. This film is icky in a very odd way, especially when you consider who this film is aimed at. There are lines in this film where our animated main character refers to himself as sexy and also states in no uncertain terms his desire to bed the human leads sister- creepy and weird.

Moreover, the film can’t seem to decide on its own mythology, it makes up various things about the wider Easter Bunny mythos on the fly and changes them throughout the film in a similar manor, as you would assume this creates a number of issues and problems for the plot.

Furthermore, far be it for me to tell you the reader what is and isn’t a good message for your kids, or just kids generally, but I don’t think this film isn’t the way to go. Whereas other films might have a message of believing in yourself or being nice to outsiders, this film seems to live with the lessons of spite. The human lead played by James Marsden, the only real pro of the film, is a man child who achieves character growth by the end of the film by spiting his father- really?

Overall, this is poor and more than a little icky, the only positives are Marsden and the fact that it is often unintentionally hilarious for all the wrong reasons.

Pros.

Marsden

It is unintentionally funny

Cons.

The weird sexual stuff

The message

The logic of the film and the wider story

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Outcast: Nicolas Cage’s Weirdest Haircut Yet

Outcast

1.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

So I put this on for two reasons, Nicolas Cage and Hayden Christensen. Cage is barely in this film after the opening 5 minutes appearing what feels like hours later, but is in fact less, to be present for the final fight- clearly a pay check role for him. Christensen fares better and has some good fight scenes that at least make his character some what memorable.

Liu Yifei is in this film- yes that is the woman with the terrible views on freedom and who stared in the recent Mulan live action film: she is okay but does not really have much to do here. What she and other characters do have to do however is spout weirdly clunky racist lines every now and again. Yes there are comments such as ‘white devils’ and ‘do white people actually bathe I’ve heard they don’t’, to paraphrase, thrown into this film, why? Who does this serve?

The only real pro I can give this film is that it has cool fight scenes, the fights themselves are well choreographed and look suitably impressive, however everything around and in-between them is dull, cliched and vaguely racist.

Overall, Cage and Christensen deserve better.

Pros.

The fight scenes are well done

Cons.

It is racist ‘

It is uninspired

It feels like a straight to DVD film in all the worst ways

The CGI in the first section is particularly terrible

Bright: Bad Boys With Orcs

Bright

2/5

Written by Luke Barnes

I remember when this first came out and it was the talk of the town before quickly slipping into infamy. I gave it a miss as it didn’t appeal to me, then the other night I decided I would finally check it out and it mildly exceeded my low expectations- that is not to say this is a good film.

I won’t get into the Max Landis stuff, he is a creep, and his involvement tars proceedings, moreover his writing is probably the worst part of the film. The contrast of real world racism mixed with bizarre fantasy elements, sounds like an idea that won’t work and in execution it doesn’t. The incredibly on the nose metaphor becomes muddied as the fantasy elements clash.

Moreover, Will Smith is not trying here at all- he has long since given up trying and this film is further proof of that.

Overall, a horribly clashing mess

Pros.

Some of the fantasy elements work

The soundtrack is strong

Cons.

Will Smith

Max Landis

The mixing of racism metaphor and fantasy

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Mortal Kombat: Cringe-ality

Mortal Kombat

2.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

A while ago I wrote that the images/ trailers we had seen from the new Mortal Kombat film looked like a fan film rather than a multi-million dollar Hollywood blockbuster, and now that I have seen the film I can say that this doesn’t just apply to the promo material but rather the whole film.

There is promise to be found here, the film clearly has a lot of love towards the games and tries to cram in as much as possible on that front. As well the film also boasts some quite well done fight scenes that are nice to look at, however the legendary fatalities of the games, that have inspired generations of shocked and outraged parents, here feel quite tame and almost gimmicky at times.

Moreover, the casting for a lot of the characters is off. I understand that the film doesn’t want to be a blatant copy of the games, but a lot of the characters here don’t look in any way similar to their game counter-parts sometimes to a distracting degree. It almost, to get back to that fan film angle, feels like a group of friends re-enacting their favourite scenes over one long weekend in early September.

Finally, and perhaps worst of all, the writing is far too try hardy and often falls into the category of cringe. Many of the classic lines from the games are featured here, but they do not feel organic to the story or the situation instead they feel forced in for the sake of fan service.

Overall, on the bad side of meh entertaining enough for a one off viewing, but it will be almost immediately forgotten afterwards.

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Charlie And The Chocolate Factory: Turning Willy Wonka Into A Sociopath

Written by Luke Barnes

Charlie and The Chocolate Factory is a fantasy family film directed by Tim Burton, based on the Roald Dahl book of the same name. The plot sees a group of lucky golden ticket winners get to explore a mysterious chocolate factory that is beyond imagining.

When people ask what is the most needless remake? I don’t see this film’s name come up nearly enough. It is a step down from the original Gene Wilder version in nearly every way, and I truly do believe that Burton was the wrong choice to direct this film- the book is really the anthesis of his standard mo.

Johnny Depp is trying his best as Willy Wonka, but he doesn’t play the character in the way we would expect or want, instead he plays Wonka as a cold, almost vindictive at times character who is drawn off and eccentric. Again this is very typical for the Depp-Burton dynamic, but it is not what anyone would want for a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory film.

Freddie Highmore is meh as Charlie, and really adds very little to the film.

The worst bit about this film is just how keen it is to explain away the mystery behind Wonka and his past, creating a social outcast, daddy issues, sub plot because why not.

Overall, it is as if Burton and the executives who signed off on this film had never read the book before.

Pros.

A few minor unintentional laughs

Cons.

Depp is miscast

Burton and his style don’t fit the film

There is a crucial misunderstanding of the source material

They demystify Wonka

2/5

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Addams Family Values: The Goth At Your Summer Camp

Written by Luke Barnes

Addams Family Values is a family, fantasy, dark comedy film directed by Barry Sonnenfeld. The plot sees the Addams family welcome a new member into their family. Meanwhile Uncle Fester (Christopher Lloyd), is seduced by black widow Debbie (Joan Cusack), and the family has to fight to get him back.

This is very much more of the same, if you enjoyed the first film you will enjoy this. If I had to pick between the two films and say which was better I would probably pick this one, as the story is slightly more engaging and the idea of the Addams children going off to summer camp is bound to inspire at least a few chuckles. Though I preferred it more than the first, I would not say this was technically, filmmaking wise, better

I thought both of the of the storylines here were well done and entertaining, there are a few slow moments here and there, but these are only minor and really don’t affect the film hugely.

I found the Addams brood to be just as likeable as they wear in the first film, with a young Christina Ricci as Wednesday being, of course, the standout; Ricci really should come back for the Wednesday live action show that Tim Burton is working on, I’ll be disappointed if she doesn’t. My one criticism on this front would be that, as characters I don’t feel like they really progress, the arcs they go through are incredibly limited, and where the characters start at the first frame of the first film to where they end at the last frame of the second film is virtually indistinguishable- there really is no character growth.

The humour this time around still made me laugh, but perhaps not as much as in the first film and I did notice that more of the jokes feel flat.

Overall, more of the same.

Pros.

Ricci

The Addams are still fun to watch

The summer camp plotline is a lot of fun

Cons.

The characters don’t really progress

The humour is a little weaker this time around

3/5