Is it a perfect movie? No. I still think Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was better. But that's become my favorite movie of all time. But it is a great movie. There's roughly three acts in this movie. The first act deals with the devastating ramifications of the Snapture. It's dark, depressing. And then there's hope. The second act is just a hilarious and fun filled treat for the fans. And the third act?
...Holy shit. There are no freaking words. Just... Damn. It is... There is no status quo reset at the end of this movie. This movie changes everything going forward. The perfect ending to an era, and an awesome beginning to a new one.
People are wondering what's next? Well, without talking about who and what was introduced in Endgame... We still have the upcoming Spider-Man: Far From Home movie here, which is the last of the Marvel/Sony co-productions. (But we're pretty sure it's not going to be the last time they work together. Marvel's made too much money for Sony.) There's plans for a Black Widow movie. (No comment.) The Eternals, which could be pretty cool depending on what version they go with. (I think they'll probably go with the Neil Gaiman take.) Doctor Strange and Black Panther is all set for a sequel as well the return of James Gunn to Guardians 3, after he finishes DCs The Suicide Squad. Captain Marvel made a billion dollars so that's a guarantee return as well, and she wants to introduce a certain young Pakastani-American girl in there. (*fistpump!*) And then there's the recently announced Shang-Chi, by Destin Daniel Cretton... Which if you're not familiar with his work, you are in for a treat!
Agents of SHIELD Season 6 starts on the 10th. (Oh yeah! A major character from the TV shows played by the same actor showed up in Endgame for a pretty obvious cameo. I think we can put to rest the whole unconnected stuff now.) I understand why people may have left the show early one, but it turned itself around big time with Season 4, and never stopped kicking ass. For example, as bad as the Thanos snapture was... It was almost worse for Earth, if not for Quake and the team. Cloak and Dagger is in it's second season right now, and a new season of Runaways was announced with a crossover with C&D. There's a Squirrel Girl and the New Warriors show floating about somewhere, but until we see more announced, I think we have to put that one on a "wait and see" list.
We have the upcoming Disney+ shows of Loki (which this movie does set up!), WandaVision (I have no idea how they'll pull this one off), the recently announced Hawkeye show, which will involve Kate Bishop or a Kate-archtype, which the directors of Endgame was aware of. And there's the new What If animated series, as well as the Hulu Animated series too of M.O.D.O.K., Hit-Monkey, Tigra & Dazzler, and Howard the Duck. All of which may or may not be canon with the MCU, but honestly, considering the voice actors and the content... As well as where Howard the Duck is at this moment... I think it may be. Then there's the big one, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. And considering Endgame's ending, it might require a new title. (It's also the one I'm most excited for now!)
And of course there's the recent Fox acquisition, which brings home the X-Men. So yeah. The future is looking pretty damn awesome.
But if you ask me what's the next big thing for the MCU? I'm pretty sure it's gonna come in the form of the number 4.
So yeah. Avengers: Endgame is really good.
Favorite MCU movies in order...
First tier here are like the really excellent movies. Basically A+ through B+ movies.
1. Guardians of the Galaxy - Hit me right in the perfect nostalgia point.
2. Black Panther - I can't add anything. I thought it was near perfect.
3. Captain America: Winter Soldier - Same as Black Panther, just T'Challa was a bit more.
4. Thor: Ragnarok - I have too much fun with this movie. Just the sheer insanity was worth it for me.
5. Avengers - It was the original crossover that's never been done before so it needs to be here.
6. Captain America: Civil War - It's flawed, but damn... That airport battle.
7. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 - Didn't get me as strong at GotG v1, but still enjoyed it.
At this point, we're at what I considered good. Basically B+ through C+
8. Captain Marvel - I don't care what the haters say. I really liked it. It ain't perfect, but I had a tons of fun with it!
9. Captain America: The First Avenger - I have a soft spot for period pieces, like this, the Rocketeer and even the Shadow.
10. Avengers: Infinity War - This was a big and impressive deal and it deserves it's accolades. Though it's only half the story, so... Number #10 on the list.
11. Ant Man and the Wasp - Both Ant-Man movies I just greatly enjoyed. I got nothing negative to say. They're just fun.
12. Ant-Man - Same.
13. Doctor Strange - Yeah, it's basically "Magic Iron Man" origin, but it was trippy and fun. Plus the "I've come to negotiate" scene was awesome.
14. Iron Man - The movie that kickstarted it all. It was really good for it's time. Now it's just a decent movie.
15. Spider-Man: Homecoming - I gotta be honest, once he got rid of the high tech suit and went to his normal suit? I loved it. But otherwise, I was kinda... Itg's okay.
And the average movies. C+ through D+. I don't think there's an outright failure of a MCU movie. Even the worst is still better than other's best.
16. Avengers: Age of Ultron - This should have blown my brains out about how awesome it could have been. Instead... Meh.
17. Iron Man 3 - Hasn't aged as well as I thought it would. I like it, but I'm not rushing out to see it again anytime soon.
18. Thor - Yeah... It's Thor. It's okay.
19. The Incredible Hulk - I appreciate how it handled being a sequel to the 2003 Hulk movie and was a reboot at the same time. (I'm kinda doing the same thing.)
20. Thor: The Dark World - I won't lie. Darcy saved a lot of this movie for me.
21. Iron Man 2 - It meant well, but that ending kinda sucked.
And just for fun, here's my choices on the MCU TV side of things. (I did not include Cloak and Dagger on here, because I just haven't seen it yet.)
1. Daredevil - Season One and the first half of two was amazing. The second half kinda wasn't, but S3 was awesome again.
2. Agents of SHIELD - I could write an entire essay about this show. Look, I understand why you might have left early on... S3 was REALLY bad. But with S4? It turned itself around and never stopped kicking everything and everybody's asses.
3. Jessica Jones - Season 1 was fantastic. Season 2... Less so.
4. Runaways - It's a decent show. I got no real issues with it. I just wish the whole Disney-Fox deal was done sooner so Molly could still be a mutant.
5. Agent Carter - Like Jessica Jones. Season One was great. Season Two, less so.
6. Luke Cage - Season One was great... Until Cottonmouth was killed. It never regained that momentum.
7. Iron Fist - Season One is actually a great corporate board room drama series... Unfortunately, it was hyped as a martial arts show. S2 was way better.
8. The Defenders - This SHOULD have kicked all ass. It should have been the accumulation of all the previous five seasons. Instead it was a sequel to Iron Fist's lackluster season one, and the parts of Daredevil that wasn't fun.
9. Punisher - This is unfair, but I never saw Season Two. Season One was just... It dragged for me. I feel like it would have been the show that the younger, more angrier me would have liked, when I was 15-20 years old. But with more relaxed and less angry me in my 40s? It has it's fans and I appreciate it, but I'm not one of them. Sorry.
10. The Inhumans - The only Marvel show I never finished. Even adorable Lockjaw could not save it. (I'm hoping that AoS gets him next season, since Gregg Clark said that Lockjaw was his favorite.)
And in case you're curious... The Fox X-Movies
1. Deadpool
2. Deadpool 2
3. X-Men: First Class
4. Logan
5. The Wolverine
And you can scatter the rest wherever the hell you want. (Though I would place the Legion show at 4.5 for Aubrey Plaza alone.)
The Sony Spider-Movies are even easier.
1. Spider-Man 2
2. Spider-Man
3. Amazing Spider-Man
4. Spider-Man 3
5. Amazing Spider-Man 2
And if you're wondering where Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse goes? Way up top, above Guardians of the Galaxy 1. It's become my favorite movie of all time.
Bumblebee and the TF movies
I’ve been giving my thoughts on the Transformers movies on here ever since the first live action TF movie hit the screens in 2007.
With the animated movie from 1986, I can’t really properly give an opinion on it. I know structurally it’s a mess and not really that deep or great of a movie… But it was so influential on me as a kid, and even to this day, that I really can’t give a real opinion on the matter. But the live action ones? That’s not a problem. It wasn’t really my childhood, so I had no problem trying to be subjective about it… Or so I thought.
My opinion of them has changed over the years. So if you read my thoughts of them then, they do not reflect my thoughts of them now. It’s like Man of Steel. At the time, I loved it, because I was so desperate for a Superman movie, that I just took whatever was offered and tricked myself into liking a bad movie. Same thing. But just to recap:
Transformers: A mostly decent movie, but it sometimes felt like it wanted to be three different movies. A coming of age movie, a military movie and an alien sci-fi movie. The coming of age part was okay, but the military movie felt a little “HOO-RAH!” for my tastes. And the sci-fi part was, at the time, nothing I had really seen before on the screen. So that held my attention. But looking back, I kinda liked the part with Sam and Bumblebee, but the rest is… Well, just okay.
Revenge of the Fallen: Literally more of the same. I defended it before, because… I don’t. Maybe I was going through some depression or something, because it wasn’t long after my mom’s death and there was some happy memories tied to the first one with her. There’s still some interesting bits with it and I can still watch and kinda enjoy it… But the movie pretty much deserves it’s vitriol and I won’t/can’t defend it really.
Dark of the Moon: Yeah. Um… The part about the space race and Transformers on the moon? I loved that part. Even still today. But the rest? It’s really NOT GOOD AT ALL. The removal of Mikaela for Carly was… Was just kinda disgusting in general. Like, “Oh, the hot chick has an opinion? Let’s get rid of her and get a more docile one!” Say whatever you want about Megan Fox, but Mikaela at least had a personality. The Wreckers were a neat addition, but not that neat. There was all these things that happened in-between movies, but we never got any real development on them. The comics did a little work into that, but it’s a little frustrating when it goes only one way. John Barber could only do so much. If Bay had left with this one, I would have had a lot more positive thoughts on the entire franchise in general.
Age of Extinction: *deep breaths* Oh God, I hate this movie. Any goodwill, which wasn’t much, that was created in the previous three movies were crapped on and shot in the back of the head. (Seriously, what POSSIBLE justification was there for the ‘Romeo and Juliet Clause’ scene? I’m mean it. WHY?! That’s some serious Weinstein levels of creepiness, that I think we need to ask Michael Bay’s former stars if they’re okay and if they would like to come forward.) I could rant and rant about this, but I’ll move onto the next.
The Last Knight: I have trouble saying it’s a worse movie than the fourth one, because I’m not too sure it’s even a movie. There’s so much stuff thrown in there and so fast that it does not work as a narrative, much less as an installment of a film series. There’s one scene where Optimus is turned into Nemesis by Quintessa, I get up to use the bathroom and I come back and suddenly they’re talking about Merlin’s DNA and they’re on a sub who’s an Autobot. And Bumblebee was in WWII and… Whatever. The movie bombed. It deserved it.
Which brings us to Bumblebee.
By now, I’m sure you’ve all heard that it’s a good movie. Well, I’m happy to say that the rumors are true. It IS a good movie. Not just a good Transformers movie, but a good movie… Period. It’s adventurous, funny when it needs to be and tense when it has to be. Director Travis Knight and writer Christina Hodson has made a real fun movie, and it’s a night and day difference here.
(Or a Knight and Bay difference.)
(I apologize for nothing.)
The characters are mostly well defined, especially the villains, Dropkick and Shatter. Bumblebee is extremely charming, lovable and adorable. The main humans here, Charlie, played by Hailee Steinfeld, is possibly the most defined and welcomed human ally in the entire TF mythos, since… Probably Sari Sumdac? Maybe Jack Darby? The point is, she’s great. Steinfeld carries the role amazingly and with absolute passion.
I’m sure you’ve heard people make jokes of it being the Shape of Water but with robots? It’s not exactly true. (Sorry Ms. Ellis!) The chemistry between Charlie and Bumblebee is honest and believable… Like actual friends. Unlike Sam Witwicky, who was just a frickin’ asshole to ‘Bee. Charlie’s loving friendship with Bumblebee felt real… Which I can see why people thought that there was something romantic there… But the subtext is not REALLY there. That’s once again due to Hailee Steinfeld being a great actress. I would love to see her character pop up again, but I‘m not holding my breath, because I really believe this girl’s going to have a real movie career and be too good to show up in silly toy movies. John Cena’s a lot of fun in here, as is Jorge Lendeborg Jr., who plays her friend Memo is also adorkably fun too. There’s a backstory the movie involving Charlie’s family I felt wasn’t as developed as much as it should have been, and I can’t help but to wonder if that was cut down for time constraints. (That’s another thing. This movie does NOT wear out it’s welcome! It’s two hours and done.)
Look, I could go off forever on how enjoyable this movie is. It’s like the Power Ranger movie. It’s better than it has any right to be. Is it better than Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse? No. It’s not going to win any Oscars or Golden Globes either. But it IS a solid and fun movie. It is opening opposite of Aquaman and Mary Poppins Return, as well as last week’s Spider-Verse movie, so it’s got some competition. However… It’s got a smaller budget than those other movies, so they have less money they need to make. And it’ll make it. It’s Chinese release is the first movie of January, and it’ll probably do well there. (It’s a good movie after all.) And not to mention, there’s no real following competition until the Lego Movie 2 in mid February. I suspect this is going to be a long term and slow burn movie.
Now of course, let’s get to the big question EVERYONE wants answered. Is it a reboot or just a prequel? I strongly believe this is a prequel that serves as both, like X-Men: First Class did. Whatever the next TF movie is, I’m certain they’ll follow this movie’s lead and just casually ignore the "continuity" of the earlier films.
If you only see one movie this holiday season, go see Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. But if you see two? See Bumblebee as well. Maybe Aquaman too? I don’t know… I’m still skeptical, despite Jason Momoa’s abs.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse
Y'all, I absolutely loved it. It's easily the best Spider-Man movie ever made. I suspect it may be the best comic book movie ever made. (Or at least in the top five, up there with Winter Soldier, Black Panther and The Incredibles.) Seeing the style on the web doesn't do it justice. The "jerkiness" people talked about actually isn't as noticeable on the big screen, and even plays into the fun. he writing is clever, the animation is fun and inspiring. This is the movie that Spider-Man: Homecoming should have been. When it needs to be emotional, it's emotional. When it needs to be funny, it's hilarious. There's a moment in the movie... You may have seen the clip on YouTube, but it's when Miles first puts on the suit, and it's inspiring on a level that I have not seen in movies in so long.
Some people have pointed out that Miles is not the main character here and that it's the other characters, since the trailers focus on them. This is very much not true. This is 1000% Miles story and they are all supporting characters in it. I have two complaints here. I think the characters of Spider-Noir, Penni Parker and Spider-Ham are a bit underdeveloped, but that doesn't mean they aren't developed at all. Just not as well as they could have been. But just means more camera time for Miles. And I'm not 100% sold on the design for Kingpin. But if these are my ONLY complaints.
The post-credit scene alone is the greatest post-credit scene of all time. It's been a couple of hours and I'm still giggling like an idiot over it. If you like Spider-Man at all... Hell, if you like comic books at all... See this movie. It was never boring, never slow, always fun and just... The usual positive adjectives that goes with describing Spider-Man.
Been a while since I made one of these kinda posts, huh?
So I’d like to talk about a subject matter that’s been bothering me for several years now, and it’s a trend that’s pretty much been a mainstay in a lot of forms of entertainment: Reboots, prequels and decanonizing earlier installments of a franchise.
As a rule, I generally am not too fond of many of them… But I also understand the need for them.
With reboots, sometimes the story is just plain DONE and you’re wanting to retell it for a new audience. If you’re wanting to reboot the Nightmare on Elm Street movies, it’s probably not a bad thing. Robert Englund is 71. And really, the Nightmare franchise hasn’t had it’s stride since the 80s. Sure, there’s been a few movies since. But you’re going to want an actor who can carry the movie for the next decade or so, and the reboot’s Jackie Earle Haley is pushing 60 as well. Hell, I’m not even sure how Freddy vs Jason happened, because in the previous movie, the underrated New Nightmare was a separate continuity from the movie series (as it was in the “real world”) and it wasn’t actually Freddy but a entity who took Freddy’s form. And in the previous movie before that… He was stripped of his power and outright destroyed with no hint of a resurrection. Anyway, sometimes reboots are needed, but I ain’t too fond of them.
But most of times, they’re completely unnecessary. Let’s take the 2014 Robocop movie. I know a lot of people had issues with it. And understandably so. But here’s the thing: I don’t think it’s a bad movie. There’s actual theme and motivations in there. Micheal Keaton and Samuel L. Jackson are great in it. Usage of drones and the higher speed robots make a lot of sense. And the inverse of the theme where in the original, it was a machine trying to recover his humanity… In this one, it’s a man trying to preserve his humanity. It’s not a bad movie, but it didn’t need to be a reboot of Alex Murphy’s story.
Let's say we take that movie, and we change the main character’s name from Alex Murphy to Joe Smith. (Ideally it’d be a better name, but work with me, please.) Keep it the same damn movie, but insert one scene of Micheal Keaton’s character talking about a previous cyborg program they had success with. Suddenly, the movie is no longer an unneeded reboot, but a sequel. It’s Robocop: the Next Generation. It doesn’t take away from the original movie, but adds to it. You can still have the original good movie, and be able the really bad stuff. The movie would still have it’s problems, but tell me that wouldn’t have been a better idea?
We know this would work, because it worked with Creed. Rocky IV still happened, Paulie had a robot, James Brown was there when his dad died, and his mentor ended the Cold War. (God I love that movie!) But you just ignore it and just tell good stories.
It’s the ultimate device to move on from bad stories. You move past it and tell good ones.
And with prequels, sometimes there’s a legit good story to tell about how something happened in the past and it needs to be told. Take the Insidious movies. Spoilers for a movie that came out in 2010, the character Elsie Rainer died in the first movie. But Lin Shaye is an awesome actress who has the acting gravitas to carry a silly franchise like Insidious. So instead of doing a silly resurrection movie or trying to get us to give a shit about a new character… They make the following movies prequels so they can still tell stories with the character and have Lin Shaye around. (And by the way, can we give props to a movie franchise who’s lead character is a woman in her 70s?)
Monsters University and the Godfather II were also amazing prequels. We all understandably deride the Star Wars Prequels, but the Clone Wars TV show, Rebels and even Rogue One were all pretty good. If there’s a good story to tell, then… Tell it.
Unfortunately, as of late, it’s when the last movie or book didn’t do as well as they hoped, and they decide to make a prequel… Mainly to serve as a potential soft reboot of the franchise for them. Such as how X-Men First Class did, or how I’m pretty sure the Bumblebee movie will be. Sometimes, this works out awesomely. Other times in the case of Rob Zombie’s Halloween… It does not.
It becomes someone soulless there. It’s less they have a good movie and more that they want to keep the franchise going and they’re desperate to try new things. And by new things, I mean retell the old stories over again, and hope it’s new again. (Not holding out much hope for Dark Phoenix, I’m afraid… If it EVER gets released.)
Which does lead me to the trend of ignoring entries in a series. And since I mentioned Halloween there, let’s use that movie. (As it’s still in the theaters, I will not mention any spoilers for it, other than I thought it was really damn good.)
Halloween is the poster child for all these things I’m talking about. (A title formerly held by the Highlander movies.) I’m sure you all know that the new Halloween movie is actually the third Halloween 2 movie. Movie 3 got ignore when 4 came out. Movies 3-6 got ignored by H20. The ending of H20 was ignored by Resurrection. Rob Zombie’s fusterclucks ignored everything, but gave the hint that it was a prequel, that ended up being a retelling of the first movie. And I won’t even get into the mess that’s was the sequel there.
Highlander was hilarious. First movie is great, the second is awesomely bad. (I love it too! It’s so awful!) The third movie ignored the second movie just to make a sequel to the first, that just told the same story over again. The Renegade Cut of Highlander 2 removed the alien planet bullshit, but kept the dystopia future, which now made it more fitting with Highlander 5. Highlander 4 ignored Highlander 3, but brought in the TV show, which immediately took a Cleveland Steamer on the entire mythos.
These two are the most egregious examples of this, but in almost every case… Decanonizing a movie entry is almost never needed. Ideally, you want to try and not make a piece of crap in the first place. But in all long running franchises, it happens. You get a Moonraker, or a Star Trek V, or a Spider-Man Clone Saga, or a Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, or an Episode II. The solution isn’t to freak out and start cutting entries from a series, but to just ignore it, move forward and counter it with a better story. Movies, comics, anime, books… That’s ALWAYS been the best solution.
And I’ve never seen it fail. Ever. But the key word there is “A BETTER STORY.” If you just try to counter the crappy story with a crappier story, that just leads you to a reboot faster.
But at what point in time do you push the reboot button?
It’s a good question, actually. Sometimes, it’s a mixed bag. In the case of the James Bond franchise, Die Another Day really sucked, but I’m certain it wasn’t any worse than License to Kill or Moonraker. Though Casino Royale was pretty good… So that worked out all right. And as did the recent Halloween movie. But what about other movies? Highlander: The Source was awful. It decided to jump ahead to a dystopian future where it looked less like a recognizable world and more like the bad second season of War of the Worlds. Superman Returns left Lois married to Cyclops who thinks Superman’s kid is his. How do you resolve THAT? Without murdering the kid, making Lois look worse, or having to hire sexual predators Bryan Singer and Kevin Spacey again? (Can someone please ask Tristan Lake Leabu if he’s okay?)
So in summary, because this is the internet and no one likes reading, unless it’s in Buzzfeed List forms or 280 characters or less. Reboots suck, unless it cannot be avoided or ignored. I’m tired of prequels, but if there’s a good story involved, it’s cool. But if it’s just an attempt to prolong a franchise with a hidden reboot, it’s a little less cool. And just decanonizing entire movies, because you think Superman as a deadbeat dad and Lois as a manipulative bitch is a better story idea than the Nuclear Man is just… Just no.
Look I truly believe that the only time the reboot button needs to be pushed is when your franchise has veered so far from it’s original source, and you cannot get it back there without “Days of Future Pasting” it…
Then it’s probably okay to push the button, Frank.
P.S. I have mixed feelings on the Transformers franchises in all it's multiple forms and the whole idea of reboots. If people are really interested in it, I can go into it. But yeah... That's there.