Tag Archives: Action

Aquaman review

23 Saturday Feb 2019

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Imperius rex?

by Thom Yee

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Aquaman images courtesy of Warner Bros. Pictures

Ask any of us comicbook fans, any of us REAL comicbook fans, whether or not we’re happy that there are so many superhero movies right now and most of us will tell you that of course it’s something that makes us happy.  It’s great.  It’s great that the things we like are now so popular.  Ask any of us fans if we’re surprised that they’re so popular, though, and most of us will probably say that yes, we’re also very surprised.  And it’s not that we’re surprised to see normal, everyday people getting into the same kinds of stories we’ve been reading about for most of our lives, it’s just kind of shocking to us that we could ever get here.  The superhero movie age we live in right now is truly astonishing, a promised land of sorts, and the type of thing we comicbook people had imagined might happen in some other reality but thought could never happen in this one.

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Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse review

19 Saturday Jan 2019

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Miles Morales > Tom Holland > Andrew Garfield > Tobey Maguire

by Thom Yee

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Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse images courtesy of Sony Pictures Releasing

The theory of the multiverse suggests that there exists different universes parallel to our own. In at least one interpretation of the theory, the number of parallels continues to stretch out and grow into infinity. That means that there’s a universe where you, the reader of this purported review, and I, the writer of it, have not only met, but I may even have killed you in that universe (in fact, I probably would have killed you in most of them if we’re being honest; it’s just a personal flaw I have, a hair-trigger temper matched with a dedication to violence that I’m sure would transcend most universal barriers). But, with the concept of infinite parallel universes in mind, there are probably a lot of worlds in which I may have saved you from death as well (probably not the other way around, though; again, a lack of being saved is something I feel is probably close to a universal constant given my innate resistance to receiving help). And then, extrapolating with infinity in mind even further, all of that saving I could be doing in all of those other worlds could be with the aid of superpowers. I might have been bitten by a radioactive spider and not died from radiation poisoning [or my fear of spiders] but instead gained the proportionate strength(s) of a spider in one. Or I might share a telepathic link with a radioactive spider with whom I co-pilot a bio-mechanical spider suit in another. Or I might even be some sort of totemic spider spirit who imbues my chosen champions with the greatest virtues of the spider in another still. Or maybe you are instead. Or something. Or something else. Or something else still. Ad infinitum.

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Daredevil season 3 review

15 Saturday Dec 2018

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We’re in the Endgame now

by Thom Yee

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Daredevil images courtesy of Marvel Television, ABC Studios, and Netflix

Colin Farrell.

In spite of what others might insist, comicbooks have a great potential for meaning and depth and sometimes even occasional transcendence if met by a receptive audience.  They’re just like any other storytelling medium in that way.  Despite their often garish outer trappings, comicbooks aren’t inherently stupid or immature; not nearly as stupid and immature as the dismissive attitudes that would suggest they must be are anyway.  Like most other stories, comicbook stories tend to speak to the broader thoughts and universal themes we all recognize simply as part of being human.  Superman relates to concepts of power, divinity, and the notion of the foreigner finding their way in a strange new land.  Batman represents a different kind of power, acknowledging our darkest motivations meeting our greatest hopes, no matter how unattainable those hopes might be and how bad they may be for us.  Spider-Man is an everyman, facing the same troubles we all do, but, having learned an important lesson in power and responsibility, is an everyman who uses his gifts as selflessly as possible despite everything it costs him.  Some comicbook characters, though… some of them are just straight-up murderers.  Gifted with exotic murder powers.  Designed by murder artisans who work exclusively in the medium of murder.  Characters like Bullseye, whose power, basically, is to pick anything up and throw it at you, unerringly, in a way that kills you.  He’s our new bad guy in this season of Daredevil.  This time he doesn’t suck.

Not like this guy. Continue reading →

Creed II review

01 Saturday Dec 2018

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So there were still problems in Russia after Rocky beat up Ivan Drago?  What about that speech he gave?!

by Thom Yee

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Creed II images courtesy of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures

Odds are pretty good that if you’ve seen Rocky IV that it’s not a movie you hold in particularly high regard intellectually.  It’s probably not a movie you view as the dumbest movie you’ve ever seen, nor would you likely have had very high expectations of it in the first place, particularly as it was the fourth part, but still, there was something dumb enough about it that called for some sort of vocal remark.  Rocky IV, in which our titular hero avenges the death of his friend, mentor, and former rival Apollo Creed, and, in so doing, also solves the communist problem once and for all (ONCE AND FOR ALL!), is definitely the tone-deaf, adopted second cousin, mutant freak installment of the series, the one that stands out from the rest like a sore, swollen, badly in-need-of-cutting boxer’s eye.  It’s maudlin and overdramatic and yet made up of scenes with very little dramatic impact, and most of those scenes are punctuated with incredibly ham-fisted revelries at their end.  What I think really pushes the movie fully over the edge and off the cliff of stupidity, though, is the speech Rocky gives at the end, after winning over the hostile Russian crowd by beating up the bad guy/Russian mascot Ivan Drago, where he suggests that if he [Rocky] can change and they [the Russians in attendance] can change, then EVERYBODY CAN CHANGE!!  It’s not so much that the moment comes off as both under-considered and monumentally naïve (and it does!) or that you disagree with the sentiment (and you might!) as much as it’s the incredulity of the suggestion that Rocky IV, after everything you’ve just witnessed, is a movie that might have had a point.  That, to me, is what makes that final message so laughable. Continue reading →

Iron Fist season 2 review

29 Saturday Sep 2018

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Crazy Rich Non-Asian Immortal Weapons

by Thom Yee

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Iron Fist images courtesy of Marvel Studios, ABC Studios, and Netflix

We’re now more than three years in to Marvel’s Netflix experiment, and in that time it’s become very clear what the Marvel Netflix shows represent, both in the broader scope of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and to us viewers.   For Marvel Studios, these are tales of their Cinematic Universe’s street-level heroes, a part of the MCU but only peripherally so, destined to never directly meet up with or have any impact in the Universe’ big “Battles of New York” or “Sokovia Accords” (to say nothing of their “Infinity Wars”).  For the rest of us, Marvel Netflix is a collection of odd little shows, generally good but rarely great, and, for the most part, not really playing in the same ballpark as any of Netflix’s actually good shows (Stranger Things, American Vandal, Orange is the New Black). Continue reading →

Jessica Jones and Luke Cage seasons 2 review

25 Saturday Aug 2018

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The opposite of binge watching?

by Thom Yee

It’s been a while since we’ve done a review for a Marvel Netflix show, and while there are a variety of reasons for that (some of which have nothing to do with the shows themselves) there’s really only one that matters:  Most of them aren’t very good.marvel-netflix.jpg

Especially Jessica Jones.  And especially Jessica Jones season two. Continue reading →

Mission: Impossible — Fallout review

04 Saturday Aug 2018

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Moustache!

by Thom Yee

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Mission: Impossible  — Fallout images courtesy of Paramount Pictures

Of all of the Mission:  Impossible movies that I liked (which is all but the second one), I have to admit that the last one, 2015’s Mission:  Impossible — Rogue Nation by director Christopher McQuarrie, is the one I probably like the least.  For all of its strengths, Rogue Nation, unlike most of its Mission:  Impossible predecessors, just didn’t have that one scene or concept that blew me away to the point that it made a real difference in the way I look at modern action movies.  It just didn’t have an equivalent to Tom Cruise narrowly avoiding detection in the vault at CIA headquarters or Tom Cruise narrowly avoiding an explosive death at the hands of an enemy drone strike or Tom Cruise narrowly avoiding falling to his death while sprinting down the tallest man-made structure in the world.  To be fair, it also didn’t have some of the least engaging, worst-looking action scenes in series history, and to be even more fair, of all of the Mission:  Impossibles, Rogue Nation is also probably the most solid and consistent purely as an action movie, which is something I’ve grown to feel about it in the years since I’ve seen it rather than something I felt about it after first seeing it.  And now we’re here with Mission:  Impossible — Fallout, the first Mission movie to continue with a director, Christopher McQuarrie again, and the closest thing we’ve seen so far in the series to a direct sequel. Continue reading →

Ant-Man and the Wasp review

14 Saturday Jul 2018

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You’ve changed, man!  It used to be about the ants!

by Thom Yee

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Ant-Man and the Wasp images courtesy of Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

I was actually pretty fired up for the release of Ant-Man and the Wasp last weekend.  Which was strange because the original Ant-Man was the first Marvel Cinematic Universe movie that let me down [and that’s not even mentioning how unlikely it is for me to be excited about anything in the first place].  I think part of my excitement stemmed from how much more I’d gotten into the Marvel Cinematic Universe since the release of Avengers:  Infinity War a scant two months (and change) ago, but if we’re being honest with each other, you and I, here at the end of all things (as it always feels like lately), I think the main reason for my expanded excitement for Ant-Man and the Wasp (See what I did there?  Expanded?  Because he grows?) was because, as much as Ant-Man let me down and as hard as I was on it in my original review, I like that first Ant-Man movie quite a bit now.  Certainly more than my three (of five) star review might suggest.  In retrospect, Ant-Man is a real good, solid movie.  It’s got solid characters, innovative action scenes, and some pretty decent laughs.

You’ll never convince me Ant-Man is great movie though. Continue reading →