Avatar 2: The Way of Water is a three-hour Disney ride more than an actual film, and it feels as though the creators believe that’s plenty. Characters are drawn broadly and their motivations even more so. Plot elements are convenient, shoe-horned, and repetitious retreads of the first film, at least when they aren’t completely nonsensical. Themes are unchanged from the original, an afterthought at best. This is a movie that is more about the experience of watching it than the actual content of the movie.
(more…)Tag: Sci Fi
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Leigh Whannell’s Upgrade is a wonderful and devilish little concoction of a film. At its center is Grey Trace (Logan Marshall-Green), an old-fashioned “works with his hands” kind of guy who restores old cars in a near-future where all of the cars drive themselves. After an accident leaves him a quadriplegic, one of his more wealthy and influential clients offers to help him by implanting an experimental chip in his brain called STEM that will allow him to walk again.
It works. And then the chip starts talking to him.
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Most years have a few high-quality genre pieces to offer, some years see the release of a genre-defining film and a solid collection of supporting movies, and every now and then there are collisions where two absolute classics are released side-by-side (see: 1968, 1977, and 1982). But, there’s nothing quite like what happened 20 years ago. Eleven science fiction films of note were released in 1997, spanning all subgenres. This piece will discuss each of these films, heralding 1997 as a seminal year for cinematic science fiction.
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The Terminator (1984) is a better film than Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991). The three other movies in the franchise are utter garbage and will not be discussed further. And, if you’ll lower your pitchforks for long enough, this piece will provide several arguments asserting the superiority of The Terminator. I’ll compare three aspects of the films and explain how The Terminator bests Terminator 2 in each: 1.) The overall plot-theme of the story, 2.) The structure, pacing, and the effectiveness of the storytelling, and 3.) The characters and their respective arcs. I will show that the first film showcases a stronger and more original plot, streamlined structure, and more interesting characters. After remarking on the sequel’s deserved accolades, the stark verdict will follow: Terminator 2 is exemplary, but The Terminator is the greater film.
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Like a burp only vaguely reminds of the “flavor” of the Coors Light that you just shot-gunned, Independence Day: Resurgence is a hollow echo of its overly-popular predecessor. The plot of this sequel was seemingly generated by five screenwriters throwing darts at a board composed of better science fiction films and filling in the blanks with shoe-horned references to the original, at least when they aren’t ret-conning exposition into the original that was never there. Though not quite as offensive as last summer’s moronic ‘90s nostalgia capitalization called Terminator: Genisys, Independence Day: Resurgence is arguably more of a horrible mess and embarrassment.
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For the third time this summer, it is time to watch a superhero flick where some characters fight other characters for poorly-developed reasons. In this specific case, it’s the X-Men universe and the film is X-Men: Apocalypse, named after the all-power and ancient villain of the film. The eponymous character is central to not only the plot and theme of the film, but ultimately its problems as well. On a fundamental level, this film fails because it could not appropriately handle the character of Apocalypse, and you can almost feel it buckling under the weight of this Frankenstein’s Monster. There are lesser problems as well, including some poorly-used characters and a mismanaged tonal consistency, but you can trace nearly every negative back to the big-bad. Thus, despite introducing intriguing new versions of beloved characters, this is a poor end to the new X-Men trilogy.
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Don’t let’s try to pretend that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have ever been the patron saints of verisimilitude. Even in their original medium of the comics of Peter Laird and Kevin Eastman, there is a tongue-in-cheek flavor that is comfortable with the idea of anthropomorphized turtles who study the art of ninjitsu. But, there’s a distinction between embracing absurdity for stylistic purposes and simply abandoning logic when telling your story, and the second TNMT film, Out of the Shadows, is embarrassingly guilty of the latter. There are still moments that you can kick up your feet and enjoy some of the teenagers’ interactions and feats, but most of the time watching the latest Turtles is spent scoffing, laughing, and quizzically squinting at the screen in a vain attempt to understand why.
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As the thirteenth entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), and first of Phase Three, Captain America: Civil War is full of crowd-pleasing moments, but it fails to deliver on these on a thematic level. Its neutered narrative pulls more punches than its heroes, the villain is more unnecessary and forgettable than the average Marvel fare, and a potentially powerful story line is treated with all the nuance of a Political Science 101 class. As a comic book action film, it certainly manages to entertain, but it falls far short of any aspirations to be something more than the latest summer popcorn flick.
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Batman v Superman plods along with the pacing of a courtroom, which may be why it is named like a civil suit between our two heroes. Given the manufactured fighting between the two, there may have been more believable drama had Batman decided to sue the Man of Steel for destruction of property. Instead, we are left with the standard flaws that always seem to accompany the direction of Zack Snyder: bizarre use of music, rushed and unearned plotting, and action sequences that, while reasonably entertaining, strain comprehension. It is altogether a shame, because the eponymous characters are iconic and beloved – and well portrayed in this film. There simply isn’t anything terribly interesting for them to do.
Plot and Theme 