Star Wars: The Clone Wars has returned for its seventh and final season on the Disney+ streaming service. In this review, we’re taking a look at the second episode of the season, titled “A Distant Echo.” After discovering that clonetrooper Echo may be alive, Republic forces form a rescue team to retrieve him. Led by Anakin…
Horror, more than any other genre, it seems, has its hand directly on the pulse of the here and now. It has to be – our fears are changing and evolving, even while those base instincts remain the same. Our monsters may come with different, more modern costumes, but they are still monsters. The Invisible…
Serious fans of Jack London’s The Call of the Wild novel will likely be disappointed in the latest adaptation by 20th Century Studios (formerly 20th Century Fox, now owned by Disney, and one of Fox’s final productions). The novel is surely dated and somewhat problematic now, with its treatment of North American indigenous people and the…
Star Wars: The Clone Wars returns for its seventh and final season on the Disney+ streaming service. In this review, we’re taking a look at the premiere episode of the season, titled “The Bad Batch.” The war takes a turn for the worse for the Republic as the Separatist droids take on new tactics. The…
How do we know a story is a classic? Is it by the sheer universality of the characters or dialogue to the point where they are referenced consistently in later works? Is it the insight and depth of the story and what it says about the human condition? Is it the fact that it has…
Even if Downhill wasn’t based on a unique (and acclaimed) Swedish film, it would suffer in comparison to everything around it. Being borne from something as unique as Force Majeure — and the singular vision behind it — puts any adaptation at a disadvantage. But at every turn, writer-directors Rash and Faxon (The Descendants) pick the wrong…
As a refugee from another planet, Sonic the Hedgehog has spent most of his life in hiding on Earth. While he keeps himself hidden from the town of Green Hills by using his super speed, he feels close to its residents. Sonic feels particularly fond of the local sheriff, Tom Wachowski, whom he dubs “Donut…
A funny thing happened on the way to my press screening of Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (and if you think I’m typing that title full-on again in this review, well, we’ll see how the word count goes), and I blame myself entirely. I didn’t know that Birds of Prey…
In The Rhythm Section, Blake Lively stars as Stephanie Patrick, whose family has been killed in a plane crash. That crash, however, was not an accident, and Stephanie is out for revenge. The film also stars Jude Law and Sterling K. Brown. The film is based on the novel of the same name by Mark Burnell, from director…
If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. Or alter it in any way? This is generally the studio approach to creative decision-making, and from a purely commercial standpoint, it makes sense. So much effort is spent finding something which works the first time, why take risks with reinvention? Sure it impacts longevity, but weighed against…
If you were ever a kid, and we assume you were, you probably know about Dr. Dolittle, the man who could talk to animals. Hugh Lofting’s tales are almost a century old, and you might have even seen the 1967 Rex Harrison film. This time around, Robert Downey Jr. takes on the role in a…
January tends to be a dumping ground for movies. Everyone’s wrapped up in awards talk, and studios are busy pushing their films for Oscar consideration. Sometimes, as a critic, I wonder if studios can walk and chew gum at the same time, much less release a big-budget action film in January while trying to navigate…
Waaaayyyy back in what we call the Golden Age of Hollywood, it wouldn’t be unusual for studios to only release 50 or 60 films and maybe only a few more than 100 worldwide. Now, that number is generally surpassed by the end of the first quarter of each year. With that giant upswing in content…
Deep in the Marianas Trench, a group of subsea workers are drilling into the Earth’s crust 7 miles underwater. However, catastrophe strikes when some unknown force destroys their facility. A small group of survivors is all that remains of the crew. Stranded with no hope of rescue, they come up with a desperate plan. They must make…
Little Women has been both a marvel and a frustration since it was written. An immortal story of young women growing to adulthood shorn of cliché and romanticism and replacing it with simple humanism and the feel of a moment captured in time. It’s so powerful that it’s as compelling today as it was 150…
In the run-up to the release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and the end of the Skywalker Saga, we took a look back at all of the Saga films and re-evaluated them and their legacy as a whole. You can start at the beginning with A New Hope by clicking here. Star Wars:…
There are good movies. There are bad movies. There are a lot of mediocre movies. And sometimes, just sometimes, there are movies that reach the Nietzschean ideal of the Übermensch, existing beyond silly ideas like good and evil. I looked into the abyss, and Cats was staring back at me. If I were less professional,…
In the run-up to the release of Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker and the end of the Skywalker Saga, we will be taking a look back at all of the Saga films and re-evaluating them and their legacy as a whole. Star Wars: Episode VIII The Last Jedi Either a reaction to the creative…
As someone who was there at the beginning of that fateful summer of 1977, I’ve ridden the highs and the lows of the Star Wars saga over the years. During that time, there have been, shall we say, some truths I’ve clung to that depended greatly on my own point of view. I’ve reevaluated these films…
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker ends more than a franchise. It ends an era. Yes, we have The Mandalorian, and I love Baby Yoda (okay, The Child) with my entire heart, but this is bigger. A New Hope is my first conscious movie memory. Star Wars has literally changed my entire life and charted the course of…