Okay, okay. I’ll admit it. At first I was kind of a hater on the new Mortal Kombat that’s coming out soon. The previous one was enjoyable, but it felt a little weird and not in a good way. Having the star of the film portray an original character instead of one of the plethora of characters he could have played was a choice. That choice felt even more weird when said star, Lewis Tan, basically played Johnny Cage in Cobra Kai. So I became bitter when Karl Urban was cast as Johnny Cage for Mortal Kombat II, rather than retroactively fixing the first by recasting Tan as Johnny.
(more…)Category: Film
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‘Clayface’ Trailer Hints at DC Horror
DC Studios continues to differentiate itself by not following a set-in-stone timeline for their films, and instead going with what has a script officially ready. It’s an approach that I appreciate; it gives creatives time to actually be creative and come up with an engaging story. One of their upcoming movies is on the villain Clayface. And really, I am here for it.
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‘Street Fighter’ Trailer: Perfect
I found it hard to imagine a Street Fighter that could outdo the fun of the original from the 1990s. Everybody — I mean everybody was chewing scenery. They knew the film was gonna be ridiculous and they leaned into it, yet still maintained a sense of sincerity. There was heart behind it. And Jean-Claude Van Damme and Raul Julia were taking turns stealing the show with their iconic scenes and one-liners.
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Trailer for ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’
The trailer for Spider-Man: Brand New Day was released, and I’ve been sitting on it, unsure of what I thought about it. There are things that I like a lot, but there are things I’m disappointed with. The disappointment part is what made me apprehensive on posting about it. I wanted to mostly keep this website positive. Mostly.
I guess a little negativity is good? Maybe. I’ll start with the disappointing part. Which, oddly, I should probably add a spoiler warning for, even though it’s just a trailer. It seems like an odd choice to put a significant and crazy plot point in the trailer.
So! Spoiler ahead!
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Have You Heard the Good Word of ‘Dune: Part Three’?
It almost felt like a miracle that we got a second Dune movie, with it not really being a massive IP property, and it being more of a passion project for the director. One of the incredible things about the films was shooting on location in a desert, and the gorgeous cinematography. Of course, the acting was really good. Okay, okay, that’s three things, but you get my point.
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‘The Phantom’: A Retrospective
Back in 1996, a fantastic superhero film that wasn’t Marvel or DC was released starring the great Billy Zane. Sure, one year later he would play a dashing villain in the hugely successful Titanic, but for this, he played the dashing hero in The Phantom.
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‘Hook’: A Reflection
A formative movie from my childhood was a unique take on Peter Pan entitled Hook. To get the “I’m old” jokes out of the way: for the generation younger than me, Hook takes place years after the original story, where Peter Pan leaves Neverland to be with Wendy in the real world. This leads him into becoming an adult and father, and Neverland becoming a repressed memory. Peter is then forced to face his past when Captain Hook takes his revenge by kidnapping his children.
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‘Star Wars: The Last Jedi’ – Best of its Trilogy
Yes, I titled this post appropriately. The Force Awakens was a good refresher and setting things in motion, while The Rise of Skywalker was a cowardly, “Oops, fan boys angry; let’s bring it back to what’s comfortable” kind of movie. But The Last Jedi? It not only pushed the story in a different direction, but it was also meta.
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