fastpuppy Reviews

The Guest (I) (2014)

First half was decent, 2nd half was as bad as it gets

[4/10 · 9 September 2022]

This started as a decent but odd movie and honestly it could have been great... but that is not what we have here.

There is the old saying "when it bends it's funny, when it breaks it's not", the same is true of suspense movies.

The start was good even if it had plot holes you could drive a convoy through but it quickly degrades into stupid and the ending is about as campy and clichéd as it gets and has scenes that clearly belong in a bad high school horror movie.

Hopefully some of the actors moved past this train wreck. Hopefully the writer and director pursued some other creative avenue. Maybe pottery.

Lucky Day (I) (2019)

Why did I watch this?

[3/10 · 7 July 2022]

First of all the accents are painful to listen to.

Glover is a better actor than this (I am not sure why he doesn't make better movies) and so is Dobrev. I am not sure why either of them decided they can pull off these cartoonishly bad accents.

Stylistically, the movie has it's moments but the story is thin at best. Sure, a revenge movie where an assassin who doesn't care about the consequences of his actions tracks down a recently released convict. We have all seen it done more convincingly.

The audience is left doing the heavy lifting the writer and director failed to do and the level of suspension of disbelief required is near insurmountable if you have the mental capacity to walk and chew gum at the same time.

The Terminal List (2022– )

Pratt stumbles through this in search of a better script.

[5/10 · 4 July 2022]

The cast is great. The writing is thin at best and it DRAGS in places.

Visually it's too dark and increasing the brightness or gamma on your screen doesn't help much.

You can overlook the silly stuff like guns in the MRI room (this could have been cool and an equalizing element in the fight) but it's hard to overlook stuff like:

Why does he call Constance Wu's character so fast? Does he know nobody else after years in service? What about retired SEALs? Nobody?

If they got that close to him with a silenced pistol - assuming the MRI machine was off, which it wasn't - why would they not just shoot him before he moved? Why did nobody hear the gunshots? Etc...

etc...

The Guardians of Justice (Will Save You!) (2022– )

GoJ is proof that Netflix will buy just about anything

[2/10 · 10 March 2022]

And Netflix viewers will sit through just about anything.

I watched this because it had a few vaguely recognizable names.

I understand why Denise Richards did this but how did they get Jane Seymour?

The show overall comes across as a student film gone wrong. Bad lighting, cinematography, and 8bit graphics (done for "style" I imagine) make the whole thing unwatchable.

Disney Princess Remixed - An Ultimate Princess Celebration (2021 TV Special)

Indicative of the level of garbage Disney shovels into its barely curated Disney+ app

[1/10 · 28 January 2022]

Indicative of the level of garbage Disney shovels into its barely curated Disney+ app hoping parents don't actually watch the content. Shamefully bad with the thinnest relationship to Disney princesses.

Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha (2021– )

Strangely compelling soapy Korean drama

[8/10 · 27 October 2021]

I am not a big fan of content like this but started watching it because a friend mentioned it. From the beginning it was a strangely compelling opposites attract, will they or won't they drama with a great supporting cast.

What makes this show work though may be the cinematography and editing. The pacing of the series is really well done with multiple secondary storylines that round out the show.

Those Who Wish Me Dead (2021)

Good cast with huge holes in the story.

[6/10 · 11 October 2021]

The cast is good. The idea for a story is good. There is a lot to like here but it just doesn't all tie together without ignoring some major plot holes and fairly basic logic.

La Brea (2021–2024)

Trying too hard to get to an obvious point and bad writing

[3/10 · 6 October 2021]

This is drek.

I wanted to like it. I tried to like it, but it is just bad.

Even setting aside the terrible writing there are a lot of other things to not like about this.

Save yourself some time. Avoid.

Ordinary Joe (2021–2022)

Mediocre simplistic tripe

[5/10 · 21 September 2021]

This is a simple tale of alternative timelines.

So simple they even color coded the various possible lives Joe could lead. Each of his lives is more tragic than the next.

The show is devoid of any humor in favor of cheap emotional plotlines.

Easy to avoid if you subscribe to streaming services but if you don't just binge watch this along with something equally bad like "This is us".

Joker (I) (2019)

I don't understand all the good reviews

[3/10 · 21 August 2021]

I went into this accepting that it was outside the DC/Batman realm.

Simply put, I didn't like it.

Intergalactic (2021)

The show looks ok but the background sound is awful

[4/10 · 8 July 2021]

The show actually looks ok but the background sound/music just triggers headaches.

Army of the Dead (2021)

Love the cast, hate the movie.

[5/10 · 23 May 2021]

Snyder launches a great cast up into the cliché tree and slams them into every single branch on the way down.

I am not sure why Snyder had to make his characters make every asinine choice possible to move the plot forward in this plodding forced march to an all too predictable conclusion.

If Snyder had actually played for laughs there might be something there but he didn't.

The cast led by Bautista is better than this movie... much better. I hope to see everyone in this cast in many other movies.

Home Economics (2021–2023)

A great cast absolutely squandered.

[5/10 · 7 May 2021]

This is one of those shows you want to like.

You actually try very hard to like it.

You like the people.

The basic idea is weak but maybe they can pull it off.

Then you slowly, week to week, give up hope.

B Positive (2020–2022)

Started out strong and devolved into unwatchable cliches

[6/10 · 2 May 2021]

Tipton is great as surpassed the rest of the cast easily.

The plot and the writing were never strong but in "a cute asphyxiation" devolved into one of the most tired sitcom cliches around.

The Morning Show (I) (2019– )

The cast is not I question. It's the writing ... and directing.

[5/10 · 6 March 2021]

You really want to like this show when watching it. The actors are all giving fantastic performances and they are trying their best to make it work.

Ultimately though, it's a great cast and premise squandered through bad writing.

The sequence of events is forced in a few places in a way that would seem inauthentic at best. The car scene for one. The dialog is just awful in places.

The cast has chemistry and if you turn the sound off this would look like a much better show than it is.

Love the product placement though.

American Dragon: Jake Long (2005–2007)

It's kinda racist but other than that it's a good show.

[5/10 · 6 March 2021]

I am not sure what review process exists at Disney but this show hits every stereotype in the book. It's like someone watched a lot of old stoner movies about New York and then wrote this script.

It's a good show and can easily be fixed and possibly be great if they redubbed the whole thing.

Behind Her Eyes (2021)

Well acted but unbearable to watch.

[3/10 · 4 March 2021]

The lead is charming but a promising start leads to something that is soon very painful to watch.

Wonder Woman 1984 (2020)

Flawed even for a DC movie

[3/10 · 26 December 2020]

This is LONG and what there was that was at least cogent falls apart completely in the last half hour.

Plot holes you can fly a large aircraft though. The story is nothing short of ridiculous.

As to the acting. Pedro Pascal is a better actor with the mandalorian helmet on. Gadot & Wiig are better than this movie. Pine is also good in this supporting roll.

The Wilds (2020–2022)

Lord of the Flies meets Lost with girls.

[5/10 · 23 December 2020]

The acting seems very good but it's hard to tell though very poorly written characters and backstory - the exception being Rachel Griffiths who is absolutely terrible.

Story is "meh" at best but REALLY trying to be better. The story lines are less than convincing and the main plot is ridiculous. You really have to seriously work at it to adequately suspend your disbelief though. There is very little that is plausible in this.

Despite all this it is actually very watchable covid isolation viewing. It's ok, not great not terrible but honestly they tried to cover a lot of ground in 10 episodes - maybe too much - and it shows.

B Positive (2020–2022)

This show is very good but I need Gina to groom Drew

[6/10 · 11 December 2020]

Ok Annaleigh Ashford is amazing in this. The rest of the cast is awesome but she is a standout with an incredibly well formed character.

However, Drew's facial hair disaster is likely why his wife left him.

Dune Drifter (2020)

Cinematic Excrement - Dull

[1/10 · 2 December 2020]

Why is so much of this movie shot with such tight shots on the "actors"? Seriously, about 45 minutes of this 90 minute movie is practically shot up the actor's nostrils?

The result is making an already dull movie almost unbearable.

The story is bad, the directing is bad, the acting is bad. The dialog is idiotic. The "special effects would be laughable in a movie made decades ago. The texture mapping on the space ships is especially poorly done.

Everyone involved in this film should seek other careers.

Someone decided this would be good for movie night because of the deceptive name and artwork they were duped into thinking it was a Frank Herbert movie - It isn't. We watched it (frequently hitting fast forward) more to punish the person who selected it.

Buddy Games (2019)

Pathetic

[3/10 · 15 November 2020]

This could have been a good movie.

Just skip to the end for the scene with Olivia Munn after the games.

The New Mutants (2020)

The problem is in the writing and directing.

[3/10 · 10 November 2020]

The writing is terrible. The directing is terrible. The performances are mixed... there are flashes of just how good some of these actors are but they are absolutely buried in a bad script barely realized by heavy handed directing. The fault for how bad this is lies squarely on the shoulders of Josh Boone and whoever greenlit this thing without knowing the source material.

Trump Card (2020)

Ridiculous - good fodder for the tinfoil hat crowd.

[2/10 · 3 November 2020]

This is mostly nonsense and revisionist history with an admittedly declared bias.

Objectively there is some production value here (as in the camera work and editing of this garbage was good) so there is that.

It is good fodder for the tinfoil hat crowd.

Mulan (2020)

An excellent retelling of the story.

[9/10 · 10 September 2020]

If you are looking for the cartoon version... go watch that.

It's good. Judge it on it's own merits.