Wicked Review
Wicked is as crowd-pleasing and bursting with emotion as many of the great musicals of yesteryear.
Gladiator II Review
Come for the sweeping storytelling; stay for Denzel Washington’s gleefully anarchic performance.
Alien: Romulus Review
Fede Alvarez was absolutely the right choice for this movie, and he directed the hell out of it. It’s a blast to watch.
Deadpool & Wolverine Review
It’s no secret that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has had a bit of a struggle lately – spread too thin, films that haven’t hit as well as they’d like, and spinning all the plates has left fans feeling a bit frustrated and exhausted. Well, Marvel Studios sees you and feels your pain. So let’s just…
Strays Movie Review
Director Josh Greenbaum’s previous film, Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar, hit at a certain time during the pandemic, where people weren’t going to theaters, so studios were releasing films through streaming and having very successful engagement. Barb and Star was funny, quirky, and different, but I have the feeling that if things…
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem Review
Inspired by the recent success of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Paramount has done yet another relaunch of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise with the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem. Assembling an impressive voice cast, and giving us a new, artistically drawn aesthetic, much of Mutant Mayhem feels straight ripped from the pages…
Haunted Mansion Review
Author’s note: This Haunted Mansion review was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors on strike, the film being covered here wouldn’t exist. If you are interested in helping those workers on strike, please consider giving to the Entertainment Community Fund. After a weekend of box…
Oppenheimer Review
Author’s note: This Oppenheimer review was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors on strike, the film being covered here wouldn’t exist. If you are interested in helping those workers on strike, please consider giving to the Entertainment Community Fund. Oppenheimer is stunning. Christopher Nolan‘s latest…
Talk to Me Review
Author’s note: This Talk to Me review was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors on strike, the film being covered here wouldn’t exist. If you are interested in helping those workers on strike, please consider giving to the Entertainment Community Fund. With Talk to Me,…
Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One Movie Review
Most sequels operate under the Law of Diminishing Returns, but not the Mission: Impossible franchise, at least, not since Ghost Protocol. I enjoyed the first three well enough, but once Ghost Protocol hit, and with each entry since, this series has strived to top itself in spectacle, story, stunts, spontaneity, and sincerity. Tom Cruise and…
Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny Movie Review
Let’s be honest and lay the cards on the table – the Indiana Jones movies are a trilogy. Yes, there are five movies in this trilogy, so the math doesn’t quite check out, but Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny are more epilogues than…
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Review
Halfway through Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, I wanted to snap my glasses in two. Not because I didn’t like what I was seeing, but because I wanted those rays of light to shine directly onto my brain pan. My eyes were inadequate witnesses to the sheer imagination and talent on display. This thing deserves to…
Fast X Review
One of the major contention points of the current writers’ strike is the use of artificial intelligence to write scripts. The writers, rightfully, would rather not see studios use AI to craft films or television shows, and they see it as a threat to their jobs and to the entertainment industry as a whole. AI…
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 3 Review
In this age of serialized storytelling, of multi-film arcs that take years to resolve, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is in real danger of doing something that the comic books these films are based on have struggled with for decades – keeping the status quo. There’s a resistance to change, of not shaking the tree too…
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves Review
Some warning: the first three rows reading this review may get some nerd on them. I normally hate doing this sort of thing, talking about how much a property means to me – all those personal anecdotes when a Star Wars or a comic book movie comes out and how much the source material was…
John Wick: Chapter 4 Review
Based on statistics that I can in no way verify, if the internet counters are accurate, the total amount of kills in the John Wick franchise (at least before its latest entry, John Wick: Chapter 4) stands at 299. That’s important, because the 300th kill is a significant one, and sets the events of the…
65 Review
I may be showing my age a bit with this review. It’s easy to forget, in this modern age of cinematic universes and big budget extravaganzas, just how much Star Wars shifted the paradigm, and how much movie studios tried to follow in its success in the 1980s. A lot of it died on the…
Creed III Review
When Sylvester Stallone announced that he would not be appearing in Creed III, many (including myself) wondered where the series would go without Rocky Balboa as the father figure/mentor to Michael B. Jordan‘s Adonis Creed. It was also announced, at roughly the same time, that Jordan would be taking over directorial duties this time around,…
Cocaine Bear Review
If you’re already planning on sitting down to a movie called Cocaine Bear this weekend, there isn’t much more to be said. They got you, you bought into the premise, and you’re perfectly happy with wherever the movie takes you, as long as the promise of the title is kept: there will be a bear,…
Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania Review
“It’s not you, it’s me.” That’s a phrase we hear during a break-up that’s supposed to make the pain go down a little easier. I’m not the same person when we met. My needs and wants have changed. You’re great, you haven’t done anything wrong. We’ve just grown apart. Things like that. Well, after Ant-Man…