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JLine1834
Reviews
The Mandalorian: Chapter 22: Guns for Hire (2023)
South of the South, in Space.
It started with a great build-up:
The droids are "malfunctioning." Wrecking havoc on a society reliant on their labor, so that the people can live a life of luxury.
We are uncomfortably reminded that people see droids as machines, despite them having thoughts and feelings, their own distinct personality. The droids have no choice in all of this. They are programmed(forced) to do tasks, citizens deem below themselves.
The parallels to slavery in the south are impossible to ignore, I'm hooked. This is the hardest hitting scifi I've seen in years.
A then... the old guy did it. The droids really are -just- machines, and they ENJOY being SLAVES.
"Someone" at Disney took a powerful, meaningful message, and in a quest to remove offense content, ended up SUPPORTING FREAKING SLAVERY.
OMG, did I just watch that?
Besides that, the main plot makes no sense. The explanation for why the villain did what he did, is "Count Doku."
Oh, and they took a really cool side plot. That Bo-Katan was going to have to challenge Din Djarin to a real fight, where one of them could be killed, to reclaim the dark saber; and side steps it with a plot convenience.
BOO! BOO! I say BOO!
Velma (2023)
Watching it is like Talking to a Telemarketer
I couldn't get far enough into the show to tell if I really liked the characters or the ideas presented there in. (I quit around 80% of the way through episode 1)
My biggest issue was that the show just keeps going a mile a minute without ever allowing a moment of self reflection or giving the audience time to think.
Were the jokes funny? Well they might have been if there had been any comedic timing. But it just moves from one to the next as quickly as possible like an auctioneer trying to sell a bunch of defective... whatever. Too fast for anything to have any real impact.
I went into it not caring if it was true to the original source material, trying to take it for what it was. But it never spent any time building a world of it's own. Instead it felt like some sort of overly melodramatic fever dream.
Fleishman Is in Trouble (2022)
It Keeps Adding Layers
After a clunky first episode (I'd give it a 6/10), the thing that keeps impressing me about this series is that it presents everything both subjectively but fairly. Characters that were introduced as one dimensional, eventually get their due. Some of them are very unlikable, they are all flawed as hell, but that's what makes this series worthwhile. Its not a bunch of paragons you can't relate to. We are all flawed people, and letting yourself root for them despite that provides a self-reflective catharsis.
Jesse Eisenberg turns in a good, but not boundary stretching performance. Claire Danes provides a sympathetic villain. And the writing is very good, but IMHO doesn't quite get men right (but it's very close).
Prey (2022)
A Beautiful Movie
Everything about this film is so well done. You'll watch the first 15 minutes and wonder if it's really a Predator film, because they take the time to flesh out Naru as a person. She has flaws, she's a little lazy and a bit self-serving, but not overly so. And the relationship with her brother feels real.
You might disagree but I think the decision to do the movie in English was the right choice, because (at least to an English speaking audience) it makes the characters more relatable. I love the fact that all the Cherokees were portrayed as people you could hang out with, and maybe go grab a beer, rather than magical spiritual people who spend all day communing with nature(even though they do that too).
The revel of the Predator is also very well done. We get an idea of his mentally, his rules for the hunt, before we get a good look at him. Almost like he's an actual person rather than just a movie monster.
If there's one place this movie stumbles it's with the portrayal of the french trappers. They are shown as monsters with no real nuisance to their motivations or personality. But you know, I guess you can't have it all.
Predator 2 (1990)
Every Cliche in the book.
After "Prey" rekindled my interest in the Predator Franchise, I went back and watched the Original and "Predators." And I found all three of these films to be entertaining movies with something to offer. Predator had tight action and good tension. Prey left me feeling immersed in the world and genuinely feeling for the main character. And "Predators" was just good wild fun.
And then I watched "Predator2". It starts off as a cliched cop movie, and only gets worse from there. They don't even make any attempt to make the predator dark or mysterious. It's never looked more like a guy in a suit, then when they show scene after scene of him walking around collecting as many skulls as possible, like he was a kid on Halloween. That and the cops just yell line after cliched line at each other. Yes I get it, Danny Glover is a renegade cop who plays by his own rules, but can't he at least go to the bathroom without getting in a fight?
Probably the most interesting part of the movie is Gary Busey's character, or at least it would be if we got more than 15 seconds of his motivations.
This movie was made by people who only wanted to make money by catering to an audience they obviously thought they were smarter than. It's not terrible compared to truly bad movies; it's just the one of the most disappointing movies I have ever seen given the source material.
The Legend of Vox Machina (2022)
Ehh... Not good.
It's only fun if you play D&D and like Critical Role. Taken on it's own merits, it's awful.
The world in inconsistent. The characters have no struggle. Every plan they make seems to be "act dumb and hope the baddy will kill themself."
All the important things: plot, character arcs, attention to detail, things actually working recognizably like they do in real life, they all have been tossed out the window to make room for jokes about various bodily fluids.
So why didn't I rate this lower? Well, I did laugh at one of the jokes, and the animation is pretty good.