Justice League

Ultimately, Justice League was a movie that needed to happen. We can get single movies for better or worse like Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman. We can go as low as Suicide Squad, trying something new but also something that could fail and have no bearing on the overarching storyline. We can go as high as we can with Wonder Woman, making really great characters and storylines separate from the DCEU chronology and franchise timeline. But ultimately, there needed to be a movie to follow up the mess that was Batman v Superman, and Justice League was that movie...

Just a disclaimer, I enjoyed this movie. I enjoyed all of 70% of the movie. Instead of just having potential like Batman v Superman did and failing to realize that potential, Justice League really did encapsulate what I wanted out of a Justice League film. I went in with low expectations and had a lot of fun with it. It was that last 30% and mainly the last act I had the biggest issue with. And I will probably go straight into the spoilers review after writing this non-spoilers review because that is where I can talk specifics and exactly what bothered me about this film. But I will say, overall, I chalk this up as a win for DC. Not a Home Run, but at least a base hit to keep the game going, and let's be fair, that's really what they needed right now.

Justice League takes place not long after Batman v Superman and Bruce Wayne (played by Ben Affleck) and Diana Prince (played by Gal Gadot) are trying to gather warriors or meta-humans to form a team to fight back the dangerous world conquering force of Steppenwolf (played by Ciaran Hinds).

Right off the bat, Steppenwolf is not that great of a villain. Like a lot of things in this film, he felt very much like a Marvel-style villain where he was just the strong dangerous villain but didn't have much explanation of who he is or what his deal is. He just wants to conquer Earth.

Oh and he looks ridiculously cartoonish the entire movie. I think the crowning jewel of things that sucked in this movie was the CGI. Not just for Steppenwolf but a lot of things. The way the characters move, the scenery, it looked really fake. I'm usually not too bothered by CGI. I know that a being from space isn't actually there. But a lot of the film felt like I was watching a cutscene from Injustice. Granted that did give it a little bit more of a comic book feel which I will talk about more later, but it looked really fake.

The way he tries to conquer the world is by attempting to collect 3 mother boxes on Earth that give him incredible power. The entire movie is based around Steppenwolf trying to retrieve those boxes and the fledgling Justice League trying their damnedest to assure the safety of the human race and keep that unlimited power out of the hands of this alien from outer space.

Like the team making superhero films like the Avengers before it, the first act of this film is mainly meant to establish the team and who is being brought in to defeat Steppenwolf. Something that I did like about the set up of the Justice League was how they managed to establish each member's world in a way that didn't take too much time, but also didn't feel horrible rushed.

We see Batman and Wonder Woman taking down bad guys in their respective cities, but we also see them planning to get the team together.

We're introduced to Barry Allen (played by Ezra Miller) and we see his relationship with his father Henry (played by Billy Crudup) who is in prison for a crime Barry believes he didn't commit.

We're introduced to Aquaman/Arthur Curry (played by Jason Momoa). We see him saving people out in the Ocean and we eventually see Atlantis and Mera (played by Amber Heard) his eventual wife? Maybe? We can see there is a tense relationship between him and the Atlantians so I don't think that they're married yet.

Then we're introduced to Victor Stone/Cyborg (played by Ray Fisher) who was brought back to life by Star Labs and their use of a mother box. We meet his father (played by Joe Morton) and we get the understanding that Victor is still figuring out his abilities as a Cyborg and it's bound to create some drama in his future standalone films.

I have to give Zach Synder and Joss Whedon credit. They touch on every character's backstory, place of crime saving, and future conflicts very briefly in order to introduce them effectively and seemlessly get us excited for future films with them.

Overall, the team aspect of this film is the best part. I like all of these characters and I want to see them again. I really hope that's the aspect of the film that saves it because there are a lot of missteps with this film.

I thought the casting for this film was really well done. For the most part everyone had something to do in this film and even if characters were only there for a quick cameo, because of the calamity of the threat of Steppenwolf, those cameos didn't feel too forced or like they were promoting future films.

The one character I think they could have done without was Lois Lane.

I hate saying that because I love Amy Adams and I think she's a great Lois Lane but for some reason I don't think Zach Snyder or anybody at DC really knows what to do with her. This happened in Batman v Superman where she was ultimately kind of pointless in the film and unfortunately it kind of happens again.

If there is going to be another Justice League film, maybe just say Lois Lane went on a trip out of town or something.

I will talk about this more in my spoilers review but I did want to address it very briefly here because it is actually something that brought the film down for me quite a bit. Due to the trailers we know that Superman is in the film. Henry Cavill is in the opening credits. It is not a spoiler to say Superman is in this film in one capacity or another. The only thing I will say right here is, they did it wrong. That's all I'll say. They did it wrong. I will talking about that a lot in my spoilers review.

The other big issue I had with this film was the tone.

Now tone has always been an issue with DC films. Man of Steel and Batman v Superman were said to be too dark and dower. Suicide Squad was said to have a mixed bag of dark and goofy, something that didn't work. I think the only DC movie that the tone right was Wonder Woman and they got it right on the money. Now Wonder Woman came out while Justice League was in the middle of production so I imagine they were too far gone to really make it like that, but there is definitely a tone change in this film and I think they went too far to light and goofy.

This is most apparent in Wonder Woman, but every DC film, whether they've been good or not has felt different than Marvel films. Suicide Squad and Wonder Woman had jokes, but not too many and definitely not at the moments we were supposed to feel other emotions like sadness, tension, etc. They never resorted to Marvel bathos where a serious or sad moment is happening and it's undercut by a joke.

That happened multiple times and it pissed me off so much. Not only do I hate that ploy so much. But I never thought of that as DC's style. I don't know how much of it was Joss Whedon's doing, but it felt like halfway through the production of the film Marvel took over and had their take on the Justice League.

I like Joss Whedon, I'm sure he did a lot of good things for this film after the tragedy that befell Zach Snyder's family forcing him to leave the project, but a part of me wants to blame him for the campiness and jokes that were funny, but at the wrong moments. I'm probably giving him too much credit but there just seemed to be Whedon fingerprints all over some of the moments and it made me angry.

This movie felt like a comic book. And while you'd think that would be a good thing I don't think it worked in the world that Zach Snyder and DC set up with the previous 4 movies. The DC movies always had a cool blend of comic book movie and Christopher Nolan Batman movies that I actually really enjoyed. They were wild enough to feel like superheroes were on screen, but still a little bit grounded to feel like something important was happening.

Justice League feels like a lot of fluff.

It felt like it was trying to hit all the familiar notes a successful comic book movie should hit  but not really digging in too much.

And to be fair, it's a team up movie. It's getting the band together so they can play awesome music later down the road. There's a lot to be entertained by in this movie. It's a fun movie. I don't think anybody would say this movie is boring.

But it's all pretty surface level and it's trying to hit a reset button from the mess left by Batman v Superman. Overall, the film is a very serviceable superhero film. I think we give too much credit to 2012's The Avengers because it blew everyones socks off to see our favorite heroes gather to fight evil all together on the big screen for the first time. Because The Avengers had such a great set up, it's seen as a great film when in reality the story is kind of weak and the individual character development isn't really there. The same goes for Justice League. In fact I give them a lot of credit for what little crappy set up they had going for them.

I do recommend going out and seeing this film. I mentioned that it was a base hit for DC and it might just be enough to keep the franchise going. I hope that's true. The box office for this film has been pretty weak especially considering how expensive this movie was but I really hope we see these characters more. If you take anything from this movie, it will be that these are well made characters and we could see greatness come from them, we just need to do it right.

But those are my thoughts on Justice League. Like I said, I'm jumping straight into my spoilers review because that is where I will talk more specifics. But what did you think? Do you think the DC cinematic universe is in trouble? Did Justice League give us a base hit or did it strike out DC? I have used a lot of baseball metaphors in this review. Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I of course am probably going to be in the DC mood after watching this movie so I'll probably end up playing more Injustice. In case you haven't watched the Injustice cutscenes movie, here it is. Enjoy!

Chappie

Oh boy... how do I talk about Chappie...

Chappie was directed by Neill Blomkamp, a South African director responsible for the film District 9, probably one of my favorite films of 2009. District 9 was nominated for Best Picture that year and I think it probably should have won. While Blomkamp wasn't nominated for Best Director that year, he had a pretty great start to his career. Four years later he came out with the film Elysium... I honestly don't remember Elysium. I did a review for the film back in 2014 but that was very early on in my blogging days and the review isn't that good. One day I want to go back and check that film out again but from what I've heard people aren't wild about it. But still, Blomkamp had one film that was nominated for Best Picture and one film that people were lukewarm about. That's no reason to quit.

And then Chappie happened.

I saw trailers for Chappie and I didn't think it looked that bad. I heard the bad reviews about Chappie but I couldn't believe it was that bad, especially from a guy who made one of my favorite movies of 2009. There has to be something redeemable about that film...

And then I watched Chappie.

Chappie takes place in Johannesburg, South Africa. It is 2016 and the crime rate has risen immensely. To combat that rising rate, a private company called Tetravaal creates law enforcement robots. They have been mainly programmed by a company employee by the name of Deon (played by Dev Patel). Because of his work, crime has gone down.

But Deon has his own pet project in the works, a project his boss (played by Sigourney Weaver, she really doesn't have much of a role in this film at all) does not sanction. Deon wants to install a program into one of the robots that would create consciousness and create the first real Artificial Intelligence.

Now Deon seems like a smart guy. He goes to Sigourney Weaver and asks her if he can use one of the robots that have been set for dismantlement. When she says no because of insurance reasons... you know instead of being afraid of creating Skynet, Deon decides to steal a robot set for dismantlement and install the AI into it. This is confusing because Deon is doing something illegal... very illegal. We've also seen Deon with robots in his house, there really isn't a reason why he couldn't create a new robot and install this program there instead of using company property. This is one of many moments you will hate Deon throughout this film.

However, Deon is captured by a group of gangsters (played by Jose Pablo Cantillo, Yolandi Visser, and a South African Rapper named Ninja... I'll get to him don't worry). They want Deon to give them the off switch to the robots so they can pull off a heist and get money to pay back a drug lord. Deon, instead of lying to people who clearly don't understand Artificial Intelligence, bargains with these people that instead of killing him, he'll give them the robot he stole from the company and turn on the artificial intelligence, you know, instead of just giving them the robot and testing the AI on another robot he steals once he's out of this very dangerous situation.

It is at this time that Chappie is born.

Chappie (voiced by Sharlto Copley) starts his development very much like a child. He doesn't totally understand words at first, he doesn't understand social interaction at all, but he does start learning very quickly.

And this is where Blomkamp's heavy handed social commentary comes in because it asks the question where do we learn behavior. Chappie has influences from a lot of people in this movie. He of course learns from Deon who says from the beginning that he is Chappie's maker and his authority comes from that title. He also starts to learn from Yolandi Visser's character who inserts herself as Chappie's mother figure. And then you have Ninja.

Yes, there is a character named Ninja in this movie. He's played by a South African rapper named Ninja.

While Deon and Yolandi are supposed to be the nurturing figures in Chappie's life, the ones who will put him on the straight and narrow, Ninja is the drugged out step father that Blomkamp assumes all criminals have.

It's not really a surprise that this guy was a pain in the ass on set, but he's just a horrible, horrible actor. He and Jose Pablo Castillo's characters are horrendous stereotypes and just annoying characters overall. They want to teach Chappie to be a gangster and help them pull off this heist. So there's this tug of war for Chappie's humanity throughout the film and it's just cringe-worthy. As much as they portray Yolandi Visser's character as this motherly figure, she does absolutely nothing but talk in a "Motherly" voice to Chappie, and Deon, my god Deon is annoying as hell.

He leaves Chappie with the gangsters but comes back with development toys and exercises to mold Chappie into a functioning member of society. He yells just the most cringe-worthy lines to Chappie like FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS and BE ALL YOU CAN BE.

I really like Dev Patel. He's a really good actor. But when he doesn't have a good script, it can really seem like he's not that good. Nothing about this film is Patel's fault though, it is all the script.

Deon has this weird dynamic between being Chappie's good influence and being his maker. There is a weird allegory going on with Dev Patel and God which never truly makes a lot of sense. It's a bummer because despite the horrendous dialogue he's given, Patel actually doesn't give that horrible of a performance in this film but overall his character is annoying and not very smart. Especially when we start to see Hugh Jackman come in as the main villain of the movie.

Now you might be wondering why I'm just now introducing Hugh Jackman. The truth is, this movie didn't need him. There was already plenty in this movie to talk about, especially regarding consciousness, nature vs nurture, etc.

But man I am glad they had Hugh Jackman in this movie and boy am I glad that Hugh Jackman really has a thing for fighting robots. I mean he basically has the same role he had in Real Steel and boy is he the most entertaining part of this movie.

Hugh Jackman plays a rival engineer at Deon's company. He's former military and he wants to push his own robot system but nobody seems to be a fan of it. Probably because it's a giant ED 209.

Seriously, Hugh Jackman spends the entire movie wanting to sell this to law enforcement agencies and they say no. And for good reason. Why doesn't he sell it to the military? This would be really great for the military, not preventing street crime.

But this is just one part of why Hugh Jackman's character is so ridiculous he becomes the best part of the film.

Jackman is sporting this weird mullet throughout the film, he wears kaki shorts, and he's always carrying a gun the entire film.

Hugh Jackman seems to be the only one having fun in this movie and it's because his character is a psycho.

I don't care if it's a spoiler because you really shouldn't see this movie, but at one point Jackman turns off all the law enforcement robots, creates mass chaos in Johannesburg, all for the opportunity to take his ED 209 out for a murdering spree where he brutally murders almost everyone in his path.

I'm pretty sure Jackman was locked into some kind of contract so he just went nuts with this movie and just had a ball.

And that's the main problem with this movie. This movie takes itself WAY too seriously.

I get that Neill Blomkamp tells stories with social commentary, that's kind of his thing. I don't want to give him too much shit for wanting to say something with his films. But at a certain point it goes way too overboard and it just feels heavy handed and overdramatic, especially in his use of slow motion and cringe-worthy melodrama.

A story about a robot gaining consciousness and going through human development starting from birth is an interesting concept, I think that Blomkamp had something here. I've heard that Blomkamp is starting up own movie studio to make short films and I feel like Chappie could have been a really good short film

But to pair it up with commentary on crime, militarization of the police force, and transformer like action just doesn't totally fit in your grand scheme of commentary. When you pair this movie with amateur actors who are South African rappers for some reason, it doesn't totally fit in your grand scheme of commentary.

To give credit where it is due, the special effects that went into this movie, especially making Chappie move and interact with the world was really, really well done. I think great visuals are something the Blomkamp has been able to use in his films very well and I guess I have to give him credit for creating a character that is fully CGI but still feels pretty real.

But it feels out of place and campy when they give it a gun, teach it to shoot "gangster" style and try and force feed us this message about consciousness and nature versus nurture.

Overall, Chappie is worse than I thought it was going to be. I don't even think the reviews I heard about it gave it enough justice as to how bad this film is.

Neill Blomkamp was supposed to direct an Alien movie and since this movie came out they have kind of backed away from that news. Before I saw this movie I thought that was pretty harsh, but after seeing this, I kind of understand.

I don't think Blomkamp is a bad director... yet. I still want to see more films from him especially since I've seen both District 9 and Elysium and don't think those movies were incredibly awful. We gave M Night Shyamalan countless of chances before we branded him a bad director, let's give Blomkamp one more chance before we shun him from the world.

But those are my thoughts on Chappie. What did you think of this film? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. So Chappie came out in 2015, since then we have had a couple of instances of Artificial Intelligence in the news. This is the news story of the Facebook robots that started making their own language and Facebook quickly destroyed those computers as fast as they could. Do you want Skynet? Cause this is how you get Skynet. Enjoy!

What We Do In The Shadows

So since Taika Waititi is the new thing these days due to Thor: Ragnarok, I thought that I would pop in his sleeper comedy of 2015. Just a disclaimer, I did watch this movie a couple months back but never got around to writing a review for it. I finally watched it again and now I'm going to review it to capitalize on the hype after Thor Ragnarok. #exploitationofpopulartrends!

What We Do In the Shadows is a mockumentary set in New Zealand. It follows the story of a bunch of vampires living in a flat in Wellington. In this group you have Viago (played by Taika Waititi), Vladislav (played by Jermaine Clement), Deacon (played by Jonathan Brugh), and a Nosferatu vampire named Petyr (played by Ben Fransham).

The premise is that these vampires let a film crew into their home to get an inside look into their lives leading up to the Unholy Masquerade, a party where all the supernatural creatures of Wellington come together.

The result is a criminally underrated comedy that not enough people have seen. I think among movie circles it has become more popular but I don't know too many casual movie goers who have seen this movie and that is a shame. It's on Amazon Prime, check it out!

Early on in the film they turn a stranger named Nick (played by Cori Gonzalez-Macuer) into a vampire and he joins them in the flat. Him and his friend Stu (played by Stu Rutherford) show the ancient vampires how to get into clubs, watch Youtube videos, and just live in the modern day.

That of course brings its own drama but the main appeal of this movie is just these guys becoming accustomed to living in the 21st century while being vampires. This leads to some really dark gory humor. If you're squeamish at the sight of blood you should still see this movie just know that there are some parts where blood squirts out of people's necks... I mean it's a vampire movie what did you expect?

There are also some "scary" moments in the film. And I mean that in the lightest of terms because I am not a fan of jump scares and even I thought these were pretty tame. It is still worth watching.

I don't want to overhype this movie. It's really funny and an underrated comedy but I don't think it goes down as one of my favorite comedies of all time. Taika Waititi and Jermaine Clements, the directors of the film have a certain style of humor that is pretty dry. I think it's hilarious but there's a chance it might take a little bit to really enjoy. Furthermore there are a few (not a lot of) parts that kind of drag.

I think part of the reason I didn't get through this film all the way the first time was because I just wasn't in the mood for the dry humor that movie presents. I still thought it was funny but I had to be in a certain mindset.

Still I can't recommend this movie enough. Another really great element of this movie was the fact that the practical effects of the film are absolutely fantastic. The budget of this film, in comparison with other big films, was absolutely nothing and yet Waititi and Clements were able to creates some really great imagery and practical effects to not only add to the comedy, but also add to the atmosphere of the film that these guys are vampires.

These guys had to have had fun making this movie and it could have easily been made with less practical effects and still have been funny. However, the stunts and movie magic they use really do make it feel like these guys are actually vampires.

But the practicality of the film also works towards the overall atmosphere and feeling of the film. While it looks great, I think there's a bit of charm in how practical the effects are. If they had a bigger budget I think Waititi and Clements could have put in CGI and made it more realistic but I don't think it would have contributed to the overall feeling of the film. There's a scene where they run across a group of werewolves and they eventually turn. The werewolves don't look real at all but it adds to the comedy.

The leader of the werewolf pack is played by Rhys Darby who is an actor who I haven't really seen in a lot of film but I always recognize him when I do. Apparently Waititi is talking about making a sequel/spin off of this film called What We Do In the Moonlight focusing on this group of werewolves and I promise you, after watching this film, you will be excited for that film.

Overall, I hope I'm not overselling this movie. It's really underrated and definitely worth checking out. Even if you don't have Amazon Prime, try and find this film, it is worth the rental.

But have you seen this film? If you have let me know what you thought about it? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I love TED Talks. And I'm starting to love Taikia Waititi. Did you know he did a TED talk? Enjoy!

2017 Marvel Wrap Up (Part 3: Thor Ragnarok)

Thor: Ragnarok Spoilers

So obviously Thor might be the longer spoilers review because it is pretty fresh in my mind. This is also the case because I think it has the biggest impact on the Marvel cinematic universe despite being a pretty self contained Thor story.

So last time we were in Asgard we discovered that Loki had returned to Asgard and was impersonating Odin. Well at the beginning of Ragnarok, Thor returns to Asgard and exposes Loki. This is done in a really funny way because you see Loki disguised as Odin watching a play of his "heroic" death. It's great because Anthony Hopkins is acting like Loki impersonating Odin and it's done really really well. If you hadn't watched the previous movie, you could probably still deduce that Loki is the one really ruling Asgard because he's sitting watching a play and eating grapes.

This also leads to probably the best cameo in history as Matt Damon plays an actor playing Loki. And of course because this play is commissioned by Loki himself, he really hams it up and it is a really funny comedy bit at the start of the movie. Sam Neil also plays an actor in the film. I remember Sam Neil being cast in the film but I thought he was going to have a larger role in it. Even when I saw him as an actor in the movie I thought he was going to have a larger part. I was very wrong. Still it was fun to see those two at the beginning for a fun cameo.

The start of the film sends Thor and Loki to New York to find Odin but it also brings them to 177A Bleecker Street, the Mystic Sanctum protected by Doctor Stephen Strange.

Now I have watched Doctor Strange a couple times since my first viewing and I have really become disillusioned to it every time. It's not a bad movie, it just falls into that damned Marvel formula that I am personally getting sick of. And unfortunately, Doctor Strange doesn't really add a whole lot to this movie and could have been written out and nothing would have changed.

This interaction between Thor and Doctor Strange was included in the post credit scene of Doctor Strange and that is the only reason it was included. I doubt Waititi would have kept it. It reminds me of the Ant-man Falcon fight scene in Ant-man, a scene that I really hated because it brought the movie to a screeching halt in order to promote Civil War. Doctor Strange has a similar motivation but I actually didn't hate this scene as much as the Ant-man scene. It was pointless, but it didn't feel like it was promoting anything. It felt like Thor was in New York and ran across another hero in New York. It's a weird balance Marvel has to strike because this would happen in the comics and it makes sense that Thor would run into someone in New York, especially Doctor Strange. However, because Marvel has used that loophole in the past to stop the movie and promote future films I of course was skeptical. Again, it wasn't necessary, but it wasn't bad.

I might talk about this more in a future post but I think that Doctor Strange shouldn't take up a role in the Avengers. I think he should be his own entity that is a force for good, but a more neutral force. I liked how he was kind of the sage character in the beginning and was more of an advice giver as opposed to joining Thor on his mission.

Then you have Odin's death.

So again, 2017 seems to be the year that Marvel is actually killing off some supporting characters and it looks as thought they are not coming back. Odin dies in this film but instead of it being sad for his children Thor and Loki, it is kind of brushed aside. For as big of a character as Odin is, his death was almost a little confusing for me and way too quick for me to really process. Obviously you don't really have time for the emotional response you got from Starlord in Guardians of the Galaxy, but I would have expected more. Also... there was that big reveal that Loki was impersonating Odin at the end of Thor the Dark World and that is resolved in the first 10 minutes of the film. It kind of points towards the reality that the continuity of these films is pretty flawed and Taika Waititi really didn't have any intention of heading down the road that I think Marvel originally set out at the end of The Dark World.

Which is good, but at the same time a little bit confusing. If you look at the scenes from Age of Ultron where they hint at Ragnarok, that version of Ragnarok was going to be a lot different. I would have been really interested in seeing what this version of Ragnarok would have been but it probably would have been similarly as underwhelming as Thor The Dark World was.

The main part purpose of Odin's death is that he was the only one keeping Hela in exile and now that he's dead she can return. There is a little bit of retconning in Odin's character as Hela is actually his first born daughter. She was his "executioner" during his conquest of the 9 realms but when her power became too great he exiled her and now she's back for revenge.

And when she comes back she comes back with a fury.

Remember these three? Yeah they all die kind of horrendous deaths when Hela comes to take over Asgard. Lady Siff (played by Jaime Alexander) doesn't make an appearance in the film and is the only one not horribly murdered by Hela.

I get the feeling that Watiti wanted to kill Siff but since she's the only one of these characters that I actually remembered, I wasn't surprised that she wasn't in this film and will probably either continue her run on television, or show up in a Phase 4 Thor movie and they'll lament over their friends who... I'll be honest I can't remember their names.

And it's worth talking about Hela because I've had some time to really decide if she's as good as people say she is. But first let me be clear, the issues I have with Hela aren't with Cate Blanchett. She's great.

The issues come with how she's utilized. I think people are willing to give her a bit of a pass because Blanchette does give a great performance and she just chews on the scenery the entire time. She's also Thor's sister and for some reason the villains that are related to Thor somehow end up being more liked.

But the main issue is that as much as Hela is a fun character, she's not really utilized correctly in the film and she really only interacts with Karl Urban's character until the very end. I'll talk about Skurge, but my point is that you've got this great actress in Cate Blanchett and you put her in a corner until Thor and Loki, the more entertaining people in the movie come back to Asgard and even then you just have them do a fight scene. They get a little bit of banter but at the end of the day, she's just an obstacle to figure out their personal hero journey. And that's the thing with Marvel films is that they put so much effort into their heroes that their villains get thrown to the wayside.

The reason I was more entertained by Jeff Goldblum's character is because he got more interaction with the main characters. He was a foe longer than Hela was and that interaction was great. Yeah it started with a weird Willy Wonka montage to introduce him... which was weird, but still funny! But at the end of the day I enjoyed The Grandmaster as an antagonist than I did Hela.

Both villains get a pretty vague ending and I'm really grateful for that. These are two incredibly talented actors, I think Marvel would be out of their minds to really kill them off. I don't really have any doubt that Cate Blanchett is coming back. They don't give her an explicit death and while they didn't say conclusively that she's dead at the end of the film, it still is open for her to come back and be the muse for Thanos in Infinity War. And the Grandmaster is seen at the end facing an angry mob but it's more for humor not to insinuate that he is dead.

But on the other hand of things...

What was the point of Karl Urban's character? Like I know Skurge is an actual character but you've got a great actor like Karl Urban and you make him probably one of the most boring characters in the MCU ever? He literally could have not been in this film and it wouldn't have made any bit of a difference.

Also let's talk about Loki in this film.

So in an interview before this movie came out. Taika Waititi said he wanted to make Thor the most interesting character of his own film, something that hadn't happened in previous films. That title always went to Loki. Up until this point, Loki has always been the fan favorite. I was surprised on how much they shit on Loki in this film to the point where his character almost becomes a little bit worthless in the grand scheme of things.

The other thing that kind of worked against this film was the fact that the brother dynamic between these two had already been done to death in previous films but especially in The Dark World. So while there are a couple of allusions to Thor and Loki's relationship, they kind of breeze past their past and by the end of the film, Loki, despite all that he's done, kind of becomes a good guy. The fan girls finally changed him I guess.

I'm impressed that Waititi made Thor the most interesting character but at the same time he really downplayed what made Loki so great. I love Tom Hiddleston and I like his character of Loki but I feel like he should have just died in The Dark World and Ragnarok is a perfect example of why that should have been the case.

The last thing worth talking about is the ending. There's a couple things with this.

First off... well done marketing team. This picture both gets the audience excited for the film, but is strategically edited so to not give away the ending that is Thor loses an eye in this movie. It does not look like he's getting it back either.

But that aside, Thor discovers that the power to defeat Hela was inside him the whole time and he goes all Raiden from Mortal Kombat, shooting lightning from his hands and actually becoming the God of Thunder.

The other thing worth talking about in the ending is the question mark about Bruce Banner and the Hulk. In the film, Bruce Banner turned into The Hulk for two years and mentions that if he turns into the Hulk again, he may not turn back. And then he just does and we kind of blow past the fact that we may never see Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner again.

Now, I think we will because Mark Ruffalo does play a really good Bruce Banner and it would be a shame to never see him again. However, I don't think a lot of people thought of that because of the humor that was incorporated when he turned into the Hulk for the last time. Now I thought it was really funny when he jumped out of the plane all heroic and just flopped on the ground... but that is kind of an example of Marvel not really knowing when to put in a joke and when not to. It was a funny moment, but it actually has very serious consequences for future films. To be honest, I don't think Waititi was really thinking about that though... to be honest this guy is kind of becoming my new hero.

The other example of Marvel not really understanding that time to joke and the time to be serious is the destruction of Asgard.

Besides this scene really only being used for a comedic bit, it does show the being they release that brings the destruction of Thor's home Asgard. A world we have come to known. And there's a moment where it is being destroyed and their new rock friend makes a joke about how it could be saved right before it blows up. The joke is funny, however, after some time after watching the film I realized how bad of timing that scene was and the perfect example of the Marvel bathos that they're so known for. It's entertaining but it pulls away the magnitude and keeps me from really being invested in the plight of the characters.

But the last thing worth mentioning is the mid credits scene where Thor's ship full of Asgardians are flying to Earth and they run into a huge ship. Who's ship is that? What does this mean for our heroes? FIND OUT NEXT TIME ON THE ONGOING MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE THAT WILL CONTINUE UNTIL THE DAY WE ALL DIE!

The big theory is that that is Thano's ship and this will kick off Infinity War with Thor and his people being Thano's prisoner or something. It was a pretty bait and hook for the end of the film and it does get me excited for Infinity War.

I might do a fourth part of this to talk about how all these movies connect and point us towards 2018 when Infinity War Part 1 starts. The thing is I've tried to make predictions in the past and have been very very wrong. And if Thor Ragnarok tells us anything, it means that Marvel may seem like it's going in a certain direction but then the winds of public opinion and directors will blow and the result will be totally different. It honestly makes me a little bit nervous for Infinity War but I think the biggest thing that 2017 Marvel movies pointed to was Phase 4. All three movies from 2017 were pretty self contained films which I actually really liked. I don't really need these movies to be directly connected to Infinity War.

With a couple of exceptions, mainly the use of Donald Glover in Spider-man as a hint of Miles Morales and Doctor Strange's really unnecessary cameo in Thor, 2017 Marvel movies kept the story on track for the most part and didn't really allude too much to Infinity War. It made the movies feel a little more solid on their own two feet and I think a lot better than previous MCU outings.

As convoluted as this whole cinematic universe is getting and as much as I complain about a lot of the formulas and recurring issues with these movies, it's obvious that I like them. I feel like if you can't critique the things you like that you probably don't like them as much as you think you do.

I know I said I was going to do a 4th part but I don't want to beleaguer this concept and I have other stuff I need to review. I might do a universe prediction/theorizing post soon once we hear more about Infinity War but until then, these have been my 2017 Marvel Spoiler Wrap up. What do you think of what's going on in the Marvel Cinematic Movies? Which of the three that came out this year was your favorite? Was there anything that I missed? Comment and Discuss Below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. Whenever I can throw a shout out to Screen Junkies I try to because they're a real big source of entertainment for me and I like to share their stuff. Enjoy!

2017 Marvel Spoiler Wrap Up (Part 2: Spider-man: Homecoming)

Spider-man Homecoming Spoilers

So this spoilers review might be a little shorter because it has been a hot second since I've seen Spider-man Homecoming.  I actually just bought it on ITunes and did a quick re-watch just to get the main points of what really stood out to me. It won't be as long as the Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 spoiler rant but then again, this movie didn't have a lot of spoilers in it, at least none that I really think are worth mentioning almost 5 months later. Spider-man Homecoming might go down as one of my favorite MCU films and as cautious as I was in my first review, I have to say this was a really good film.

And it's ironic that I was just praising this film and I'm going to talk about the part of the film I really didn't like and that was the MJ reveal.

So for months prior to this movie coming out, there was this big controversy over Zendaya playing a character who a lot of people thought it was Mary Jane. Zendaya was always credited as a character named Michelle. For the entire film they were building her up as her own character named Michelle. She had no connection or resemblance of any version of Mary Jane we've ever known. And suddenly at the end, really casually she just says, people call me MJ, establishing that this is probably going to be our Mary Jane for the new Spider-man franchise.

And listen, I don't care about the race element of this. I laugh at people who do. While I'm not a huge comic book fan, there is nothing about the character of Mary Jane that says she could not be played by a woman of color. Nothing at all. Zendaya the person playing Mary Jane is not the issue.

The issue I have with it is the fact that Michelle the character is not consistent with the character of Mary Jane. Mary Jane is supposed to be the popular girl next door, she's supposed to be out of Peter's league.

Zendaya's character is Michelle, not Mary Jane. Michelle is a unique character. She's not bad, she's just not Mary Jane. And hey if they had just said her name was Mary Jane from the beginning and created a new character, I would  have been okay with it. But no they spend the entire movie establishing this character as Michelle (even though we all pretty much knew she was Mary Jane) and then tacked on at the end that people call her MJ like a really bad Easter Egg.

If Marvel wanted to make the character different, do it. If they wanted to create a new character, do it. But this half way in half way out bullshit they pull really frustrated me. Luckily Michelle's character is really inconsequential to the entire film, but it's just evidence that as powerful as Marvel is, they're still very safe with their properties. The reality is, while her nick name is MJ, this still leaves the door open for the real Mary Jane to pop up in future films if Zendaya doesn't work out or the audience doesn't respond to it well enough. That's not taking any risks and it feels cheap.

Now this could have been Sony's choice, but overall I think Marvel had a lot of creative control over this and they could have put the kabash on it and they didn't. I even cringed a little bit on my second viewing. I knew it was coming this time and I still thought it was cheap and not a great reveal.

The obvious phenomenal element of this movie is The Vulture or Adrian Toomes. As I said in my regular review, he might be one of the best Marvel Villains ever and of course, he is connected to Peter. It's not like he was a totally unrelated person, of course he needed to be the father of the girl that Peter likes in this movie.

When Peter picks up the girl for the Homecoming dance and Michael Keaton showed up at the door, my heart dropped. It was a great reveal and not anything that either I or anybody really saw coming. At first I wasn't wild about it but it didn't take long to really connect with me and especially when he has the conversation with Peter in the car with his gun drawn and he's pulling out his Michael Keaton scary as hell voice, I was on board one hundred percent.

The interesting thing about Vulture, especially with what we're shown in the post credit scene where he meets Scorpion in jail, is that there is definitely a potential for a Sinister Six film in the future, hopefully connected to the MCU.

The Sinister Six was a planned movie for the Andrew Garfield Spider-man franchise. It was scrapped when the Amazing Spider-man films were scrapped but there is definitely a possibility it could show up in Phase 4. I don't know what Marvel's contract with Sony is, if eventually they will go their separate ways when Sony can handle Spider-man on their own, but if I were Sony, I'd stay with Marvel as long as I can and get some of the Avengers in on the big fight Spider-man will probably have with a bunch of his iconic villains in the future... maybe.

While Adrian Toomes is a phenomenal part and he really does compete for the best part of the movie, the other competing element is Tom Holland as Spider-man himself.

There are a lot of really good themes that run through this movie and they mainly show up in his relationship with Tony Stark.

It's obvious from Spider-man's role in Civil War that he looks up to Tony, and while Tony is not in this movie as much as the trailers suggest he is, he does have a presence in the film. Honest Trailers recently did their take on this film and they called Tony the absent step-father of Peter and that's very true.

But Tony brings a great dynamic to the film because he teaches Peter the importance of understanding himself as an individual apart from the suit. And before it gets too Iron Man 3 on us, it also is specified to Peter in that he realizes that he is still a kid and while he can be a great hero who is more than his suit, it is still a coming of age story where he realizes that he can still be a kid by the end and that's okay.

The scene in the trailers where he is on the ferry as its falling apart and then he has the conversation with Iron Man and he takes the suit away from him is still a really great sequence of scenes. Not only

does that scene happen and it puts Peter at his absolute lowest, but then he goes home and has to face Aunt May and they have a really touching scene where he breaks down in front of his aunt.

But probably the most heartbreaking scene in this movie and the one that really hits home the emotionality of the movie is where Peter goes to confront the Vulture and he gets caught under a bunch of debris. Tom Holland does a great job because throughout the movie we've seen Peter as trying his best to be brave and be a hero but when he's trapped underneath those rocks he cries out for help and it really shows Peter at his most vulnerable. Those are the points in this movie that make me really love this movie.

And the best part is, it wasn't undercut by a joke or some bathos effect that Marvel really likes to do even in their most dramatic scenes of 2017 like Ego telling Peter he killed his mom, it was a genuinely sad moment where they just let Tom Holland act and they let the audience feel. MARVEL DO MORE OF THAT! Not everything needs to be a joke.

Something that I had actually kind of forgotten about was Spider-man's suit made by Tony Stark. He has his own Jarvis voice in his suit voiced by Jennifer Connelly named Karen and not only do we have a lot of fun seeing a montage of Peter's new suit functions, we also get a really cute relationship between Peter and Karen.

Karen of course is an AI so she doesn't totally understand human nature but at the same time it's Jennifer Connelly and she has this really soothing voice that Peter actually becomes friends with.

Something I have been realizing since watching this film is that Peter goes through a similar initiation phase with his suit that Iron Man does... I get a strange feeling that Iron Man is going to go away one way or another and Spider-man is going to take his place... but that's speculation for a future post about Infinity War.

But now that I'm thinking about it, I really enjoyed that element of the movie and it was pretty important in the second act of the film. But then Tony takes the new suit away and after the ferry scene we never hear from Karen again. It's not a plot hole by any means but we never really get much closure between Peter and Karen.

That is kind of nitpicking at this point, especially since Peter gets the suit back in the end. But it would have been nice to have Peter put the suit back on and have Karen's voice come back on and say, "Hello Peter, I've missed you" or something.

Oh and speaking of the end. Apparently Aunt May knows that Peter is Spider-man. I laughed out loud when that revelation happens and Aunt May yells "WHAT THE..." and then credits.

But this will be an interesting change of pace. In both the Tobey McGuire and the Andrew Garfield Spider-man films, Aunt May never figured out Peter's secret identity. When the sequel to this film comes out, we'll be starting with Aunt May knowing that and knowing for any other sequel to come. How will that change things? I don't know. I really like Marisa Tomei in this role so I'm sure she'll do a great job and I hope her role continues to grow.

Those are the big story plot points I wanted to cover. The other things worth talking about are the loads of Easter eggs littered throughout this movie, there are almost too many to count. The great thing about it is that they all felt pretty organic to the movie. This was more something I noticed after my second watch. I know I said that they might be promoting future films that haven't been put into development yet, but I am kind of going back on that statement because honestly I can't really think of anything that they're really promoting without it feeling organic to the story Spider-man is going on.

The one exception to that rule is Donald Glover's character. The only reason he is in this movie is to give fans an Easter Egg and the nod that Miles Morales is in this universe and he's coming. There were other ways that Spider-man could have found out when the deal on the ferry was happening and it did feel kind of out of place.

HOWEVER, after a second watch and a revived appreciation for Donald Glover after spending a few days watching Community, I will say, he is pretty funny in this movie. Honestly, I could watch a spinoff with just this guy going around and hanging out in Queens. Miles Morales doesn't even need to be in it. Did he need to be in this film? No. Did Hannibal Buress need to be in this film? No. But what we are given is pretty fun.

I think the second watch helped me come to terms with a lot of things that stuck out the first time and a sign of a good film is the fact that you notice more about it upon second or multiple viewings.

Spider-man is going to have a huge role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the future and this movie makes me incredibly pumped for that. I plan to talk more about him when I get to the end of this seemingly endless Spoiler Wrap Up.

But was there anything I missed? Any great scenes I need to talk about? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

Stay tuned for part 3: Thor Ragnarok spoilers.

2017 Marvel Spoiler Wrap Up (Part 1: Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2)

As I said in my Thor Ragnarok review, I want to do one big review talking about all the spoilers from all three Marvel movies that came out this year. These will be the parts of the movies that I couldn't talk about in my regular review. Usually a do a spoilers review not long after the regular review but this year has always been filled with special circumstances. I thought I'd create a longer review, broken up into a couple of parts, to talk about the spoilers of each film and also use this as a Marvel 2017 wrap up and talk about where the franchise is going and where my head is with those movies.

I'll repeat my sentiment of the Thor review that 2017 was a pretty safe year for Marvel. In April they released the highly anticipated sequel to the movie that nobody thought was going to be successful in 2014 but is often cited as people's favorite Marvel film, Guardians of the Galaxy. In June, they released Spider-man: Homecoming. While it was the second reboot of the wallcrawler and the third iteration of the character, I think putting him in Civil War gave people just enough of a taste that we were all really excited about this new outing. Like I said in my Ragnarok review, it was probably the "riskiest" of the three but the quotations on that word are highly emphasized. And then there's Thor Ragnarok. Thor is one of the original Avengers. While he may not be a favorite, people are still going to go see a movie about him just because he's an original Avenger. And when people started seeing the trailer and hearing that the Hulk was going to be in this film, it was a no brainer that it was going to make money and even be a pretty good film.

How did Marvel do this year?

Well they didn't do badly. This was the first year that there were three MCU films released and while I definitely have my opinions on them, I will admit that the films were, as a whole pretty decent and overall entertaining. At the end of the year I'm going to do a countdown to the best superhero films of the year. I'm going to say it right here, I don't think any of these are going to be at the top of that list, but that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy them. These were entertaining and enjoyable films. Good times at the theaters.

But I want to talk some spoilers and then some overall Marvel thoughts. So let's start with the first Marvel film that came out this year, Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2.

Guardians of the Galaxy Spoilers (There are some Thor Spoilers in here too)

The main thing worth talking about in Guardians of the Galaxy Volume two is Yondu. The main thing to talk about is his death but something I do want to mention is just how his character turned into something really great in this movie. He is retconned a little bit in order to fill a bit of a father figure role but part of what makes his character work in this film is his relationship with Rocket. While I still think the character change of heart is still a little rushed and doesn't totally make a lot of sense, especially with what I remember about the first film, they do a good job creating sympathy around this character and Michael Rooker gives a performance that makes us all see ourselves in Yondu. So much that when he sacrifices himself for Peter, it is a pretty emotional moment, especially combined with the heartbreaking performance from Chris Pratt (Again, he's kind of transcended this franchise).

One notable thing about Marvel this year is that they are starting to take fan notes and actually kill off some characters in a way they will not come back. They do it in Thor with Odin and they do it in Guardians with Yondu. While I applaud Marvel for actually creating some stakes in this universe, I will still give them crap for killing off characters like Yondu and Odin and waiting till Phase 3 to actually have some "meaningful" deaths.

The only thing separating Yondu and Odin's death from Quicksilver's in Age of Ultron is the fact that they actually do a good job with the emotionality of these deaths and these were characters we were a little more familiar with. But still they're not huge characters and them not being in the universe doesn't exactly affect the Avengers or the Guardians of the Galaxy in a big way that raises the stakes at all. Yondu, while turned into a character with some depth, probably didn't need to be in Infinity War, and Odin spent the first Thor movie asleep and the second one... Honestly I don't remember what he did during The Dark World... These were not characters that were really important in the overall scheme. So yeah, way to start raising the stakes a little Marvel but I don't think they were really raised that high.

I want to talk about Ego next.

I think this might be the thing that really bothered me about Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2. You have the opportunity to have a living planet as a villain, played by Kurt Russell, and what do you do Marvel? You have him be the same one-shot pretty paper thin villain you always do.

I mean Ego was a lot more interesting that Ronan the Destroyer int eh first film, but he spends the majority of the movie being a good guy and only really turns at the end. Now he was evil the whole time but he's quickly defeated by the end of the film and we go back to our status quo. You have a villain who is an entire planet! You have Kurt Russell playing him. You have a special relationship between this villain and one of your main franchise stars, why kill him?

Since seeing this movie I have watched a couple videos talking about the merits of this film and I imagine that if I re-watch this film, I will probably have a change of heart about this film. I stand by a lot of the comments I made in criticism of this film, but I am open to changing opinions and forsee that occurring when I watch it again, one day. But the element of this movie that might sound contradictory is that I often criticize Marvel for being too franchise-y and having no conclusiveness to it. Ego in my opinion exemplifies them utilizing that conclusiveness somewhat correctly, so while I applaud them for doing the right thing story-wise, speaking from a franchise perspective, I don't get why they didn't keep him for future installments.

Something impressive about this film is Ego's story with Peter's mother. First off they use some really good visual effects to recreate young Kurt Russell. But his main plot is to plant a piece of him on different worlds and conquer the entire universe.

Peter is included in this plot because he shares the same celestial power that Ego does and Ego wants to use him to fulfill that conquest.

One of the greatest moments is when Peter seems to be coming around to Ego's side and he sees the upside of conquering the universe like Unity from Rick and Morty... and then Ego messes it up by telling Peter that he was the one who put the tumor in Peter's mother's brain. Again, I go back to the notion that Chris Pratt is better than this franchise because that moment you see Peter's wonder turn into anger and he just lashes out and shoots the crap out of Ego.

This is a very emotional moment and what do they do with it?

They throw a Hassellhoff joke in there...

This is why Guardians of the Galaxy didn't do much for me. While there are a lot of good emotional moments, they can't quite give it the full impact it deserves because they gotta throw a bathos joke in there. The same goes for when Ego and Peter are fighting later, both of them using their power and it's this really emotional father and son fight and... Peter fights him with a Pac man Avatar...

Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 does its humor really well.

Baby Groot and when he eventually becomes Teenage (or adolescent) Groot was hilarious at the end. I'm really looking forward to how they use these characters and humor in Infinity War. But overall, as much as I want to like Guardians 2 as a serious movie, I can't. And I think I might call it the Hassellhoff Marvel effect.

That's the majority of the Guardians of the Galaxy spoilers.

There was the end credit scene where the Gold People bring up the fact that Adam Warlock is going to show up. I'm going to be honest, when I saw that I said out loud, AIN'T NOBODY GOT TIME FOR ADAM WARLOCK.

I have since read that Adam Warlock will probably appear in Infinity War and he's more likely going to be an element of a future Phase 4 film. But even still I have to just point out to Marvel that they have about fifteen billion characters they have yet to announce. Captain Marvel still hasn't been introduced in the universe and now we're throwing Adam Warlock into the mix? And when I say she hasn't been introduced, I mean there's been no mention of her at all in any of the recent movies. The only way we know that Captain Marvel is coming is because Brie Larson has been cast as her. We don't know when she's showing up or anything and we're giving Adam Warlock a post credit scene? Give me a break.

Again, while I may enjoy Guardians 2 on a second viewing, right now it is at the bottom of my top superhero films of 2017 list because it was just underwhelming.

This will be part 1 of a couple of future posts. Let me know what you thought of Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 2 as far as spoilers go. Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @MovieSymposium as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

Part 2 coming soon.