I wasn't too sure whether that movie warranted a Discussion Thread, given only Endgame got one here so far but… hey, I really liked the movie.

The pokemon CGI was amazing. Storyline was not half-bad (not great tho); somewhat predictable although with a nice twist I personally didn't see coming.

I'm not even a huge pokemon fan or anything, but this took me back to my childhood quite a bit. I really like how they mostly featured pokemon from the original 151, which made the movie very approachable to old-timers.

It also didn't feel awkward or childish or cringey or anything you might expect from, well, a pokemon movie. Loved hearing the theme music in the TV background early on. Loved pikachu's singing, that was pretty hilarious, felt like a nice place for the movie to poke some fun towards itself.

Coming out, I was reminded of how I felt after seeing the Warcraft movie: Seeing characters that have played such a special part in my life, being brought to a full-feature live-action. It's really a unique feeling. I guess that's why I'm looking forward to both Aladdin and The Lion King coming out this year; even though neither were as special as Warcraft/Pokemon, I still get chills thinking about the unbelievable CGI quality we get for what a few years ago we'd never have thought would go beyond plain animation.

I tried to keep the post body mostly spoilerfree but this is tagged spoiler so I guess go nuts in the comments.

Spoilers for Solo follow - you have been warned.

So a year after it's release and months after it went up on netflix, I finally got around to watching Solo.

For context: for most of my childhood, I was a huge Star Wars buff. I played Star Wars: Galaxies growing up, I was in the massive crowd that saw The Force Awakens opening night, I spent the better part of 2 years as part of a prerelease community for Star Wars: The Old Republic. There was a time where I could name nearly every planet of consequence in the canon and knew most of the expanded universe's timeline.

But the new trilogy has been... well, nothing. I found it to be a mediocre, hole-filled mess most of the time, too busy being Disney's Star Wars^tm politically correct safe-kid to actually be good movies on their own. Rogue One was an enjoyable exception, but still not particularly amazing... but the point I'm driving at is, the last couple of years, I've pretty thoroughly come down from the Star Wars high.

When Solo came out, I assumed it would be more of the same - panned by critics, it was presumably going to be another politically correct, lackluster, rehashed or nonsense story, this time using Han Solo's name as a marketing tactic. No desire to see a childhood hero Anakin Skywalker'd, I skipped it, and didn't even care to watch it when it popped up on Netflix.

Tonight, out of pure boredom, I decided to give it a watch and was surprised to learn that I couldn't have been more wrong. Which is to say, I enjoyed the crap out of it!

It had romance! Snappy writing! Memorable, enjoyable, non-trope characters (mostly!) Although it had some of the same flaws as Rogue One (namely that it started to drag on), it also had something that Star Wars hasn't truly seen since the original trilogy: heart and soul.

More importantly, it did something that no movie in the franchise has done since the original trilogy, and actually engaged me with the story. And this is where the spoilers come in.

First, credit where it's due: although the story tended to go on and on, at no point did I feel like any of it was unnecessary - it just felt like it was too constrained by being a single movie.

I was invested in seeing an actual romance in the story (since apparently ONLY Han Solo can do that), which saw a satisfying, and rather complex resolution. The dirty, street-level setting and story was an awesome break from the epic, world-shaking conflicts that the movies have clung to until this point (or whatever the hell The Last Jedi was). It was powered by characters, and I appreciated that.

To top it off, the reveal of Maul at the end of the movie was totally intriguing, and (IMO) beats any other reveal in the series hands-down. I was a fan of his appearances in the cartoons, and seeing him on the villain's throne in a movie, I think, would've made for a much spicier and more intriguing story than whatever/wherever/whoever Snoke was. From getting his ass kicked by the Emperor for the plot, to getting beat down by ol' Ben (for the plot), the guy's a damn competent villain that still hasn't had a real shot.

Don't get me wrong, it had its flaws: as mentioned, it was REALLY long, and I don't mean to imply that every character was perfect, or that the plot wasn't totally ridiculous in places. But the story was good enough, and the movie enjoyable enough, that I could overlook it, and that's more than I could say about the movies that caused me to not see it in the first place...

Which, to my final point, is the greatest disappointment: with the cancellation of all the non-trilogy entries in the series, it's safe to assume that Disney's learned all the wrong lessons from Solo.

Rather than attributing it's A- performance to the point that people just haven't much enjoyed their epics, remembered what happened the last time someone tried to do an origin story in the series, or were feeling Star Wars fatigue, and didn't go to see it as a result, they'll blame the format, the story, the stakes, the setting, the characters - all the things that made the movie worth watching at all.

So, with Episode 9 coming out sometime this year and us presumably going to see a mediocre conclusion to what has at this point been a completely mediocre and forgettable trilogy (with lightsabers!), all I can say is, Solo sadly will stand out in my mind as the only movie in this era that carries on the legacy of the originals. I'm disappointed, more by circumstance than anything. I think, had Solo come out 5 years ago, it would've been hailed as the proper return to the franchise that it deserved to be, far more than any of the other franchise entries have succeeded in doing since.

What'd you think of Solo, Tildes? Am I stark raving mad?

Prometheus (2012), Alien: Covenant (2017), Life (2017), The Cloverfield Paradox (2018), you name it. Why is everyone in the team is a complete incompetent buffoon? Why is the science behind the films so bad? Why do the protagonists do stupid crap? The crew from Alien IV looks like geniuses compared to these people.

Am I the only one who is seriously disturbed by this trend?

Old stories are always being updated for lots of reasons, ranging from trying to appeal to new audiences to correcting toxic depictions to fitting better to the current social or political climate and more. There's nothing new there. However, one thing I find a bit odd lately, as in the last five years or so, is that a lot of this modernization is actually done pretty poorly in main stream media. We see more forced diversity, queerbaiting, and generally bad storytelling. Not totally sure how I'll do this yet, but I'm thinking of posting stories that stand out to me for better or for worst, starting with a classic.

There will be spoilers for both movies.

Cinderella (2015)

This is one I honestly didn't think worked at all. To be fair, I believe Disney's goal was just to sell a beautiful movie, and not a good story. This whole movie was gorgeous. It was also really boring, which I honestly believe is the greatest sin in storytelling.

Cinderella herself is "smarter" in this movie than the old classic cartoon. She's well read and has some agency, which honestly makes her more a damsel than the original cartoon for me. In the cartoon, she was an abused child that had no where to go. Her being trapped made sense. In the new one, she's sort of a fighter...who doesn't fight. I didn't get it.

Another issue is that Cinderella was really the only character they modified, which is why the story is still shallow.

Ever After (1998)

This is honestly one of the best modernization of the fairy tale I've ever seen. What worked for me, is that they fleshed out all their characters. Danielle, Henry, the stepmother, stepsisters, everyone! This makes for a much richer story, where characters themselves can be modernized, but still fit the time of the period piece. It's not about dropping a fourth wave feminist into an aged story, but about adding the dimensions that would have still existed then. Danielle is strong, well read, and obedient. Her servitude is not without reason. She's seeking a "mother", and her relationship with her stepmother is more than simply being a slave. The audience is shown the moments of kindness Danielle seeks from her stepmother.

My quick two-cents. I also find it interesting that Ever After came out over 15 years before Cinderella.

So what are you thoughts? Any good fairy tale adaptations you can mention?

It's Monday again, and that means it's time for Movie Monday, a thread where anyone and everyone is welcome to post a movie review about films that they've seen recently, or just liked or disliked in the past.

If you're wanting to post a review, I'd suggest reading trough Movie Monday: week 1 to read through the rules and what to write, but for the most part I'm trying to keep this as simple as possible.

The two rules that I do have are: So far, the only rules are:

All top level comments should be reviews. (if you have any questions or suggestions on how to do things differently, either send me a private message or post in the discussion thread I linked up above)

No spoilers in top level comments. Ideally any spoilers should be in children comments (with sufficient warning) if you wish to write a review with spoilers, make another comment below your top level comment and write the spoilers there. Anyone who doesn't want to know any spoilers should un-expand the comments at the top before they start reading comments. Hopefully this should allow discussion of both the film and the review without forcing people to see spoilers.

But other than that, happy Movie watching and have a great Monday :)

So since I'm a terrible person and all that I totally forgot to make this post last week so I've decided to wait a week and actually post on a Monday. For those of you that don't know what Movie Monday is, here is the post I made about it.

Basically I'd like to make a weekly post where myself and other users post comments on what movies they've watched recently and whether or not they recommend it etc. There's no specific format set out for the reviews, so feel free to write one any way you like, whether it's just a few sentences or a whole essay, we'll figure out what works best as we go along.

So far, the only rules are:

1. All top level comments should be reviews. (if you have any questions or suggestions on how to do things differently, either send me a private message or post in the discussion thread I linked up above)

2. No spoilers in top level comments. Ideally any spoilers should be in children comments (with sufficient warning) if you wish to write a review with spoilers, make another comment below your top level comment and write the spoilers there. Anyone who doesn't want to know any spoilers should un-expand the comments at the top before they start reading comments. Hopefully this should allow discussion of both the film and the review without forcing people to see spoilers.

I know the second rule is a tiny bit confusing, but like I said this is a learning process and we'll see what happens. Anyway have fun and happy film watching!

Anyone seen this? I heard about this movie on NPR and decided to check it out. Wow! It's a great, well told story that pulls a lot of discreet threads together. As an aside from the main story of a black cop infiltrating the Ku Klux Klan it also references racist media of yesteryear like Gone With the Wind and Birth of a Nation. There are several moments that wink at Donald Trump's talking points and policies. There was a lot of reaction from the predominantly black crowd I was in, the connection was certainly noticed.

And the end! Wow. Almost had me in tears, really brought me back to a year ago when I saw the Vice News on Charlottesville. I was in a theater in Richmond, VA about an hour from Charlottesville. You could have heard a pin drop right when the movie ended. I've never seen so many people get gut punched like that all at once. The timing of this movie was absolutely well thought out.

while its not the best star wars movie, it isn't the abomination that people make it out to be. its legitimately fun to watch and comfy with all its bad CGI.

Favorite star wars movies in order: IV, V, Solo, VII, I, VIII, VI, Rogue One, III, II

So this is something I've been thinking about doing for the last couple weeks, but I've been super busy working on a project and haven't had too much time, and I didn't want to start something if I couldn't commit to it. Now that my project is almost finished I've got more time to both watch movies and talk about them with random internet strangers, which is why I'm here now asking about a weekly movie review thread.

I watch maybe two or three films a week, but often struggle to find anything worth watching. And so for all of you out there with the same problem, I'd like to start a discussion thread where users post a movie review on one film they've watched recently and children comments are free to discuss the review, the movie, or just ask questions in general about the movie.

Here are some questions I have about how this would function, and I'd like your opinion on them.

Is this something that users here actually want?
Like I said earlier, I feel like this could be a helpful tool for people wanting to watch a few things but not knowing what to watch, but there are plenty of reviews and things like that out there, and this might not be something that users here want.

What should be included in the review?
To me what immediately comes to mind is a very imdb style review (with no spoilers) that comments on directing, acting, set, camera angles, etc. Maybe giving it a rating out of 10? How long should it be? I don't read a whole out of reviews though so I'm not 100% sure the best way to go about this.

How often should we have a discussion thread?
I'm thinking a weekly thread would be nice, probably on Monday for two reasons. First, it allows anybody who's busy over the week day but has some time off on the weekend for films and writing reviews to write one, and secondly, it means we can call it Movie Monday, which sounds better then Movie Tuesday :p

Any other questions or things that need to be discussed for this to work well?

For me personally I'm excited because I really like what they've done with the MCU. It's not perfect but I think they've done a fine job so far and would prefer them to have a go at the X-Men (and FF) franchise. As a long time fan the movies have been hit and miss with the Fox X-Men for me so far. For example:

Love:

First Class
X2
Logan

Like:

DOFP
X1
The Wolverine

Don't care for whatsoever:

Wolverine Origins
X3
Apocalypse

So really Fox did okay with the rights but not as good as they could have. The Fantastic Four specifically movies are laughable. Hell the Roger Corman flick was better than it's successors. I didn't even bother with the most recent as you could tell it was slap dashed together.

So what do you guys think?

I always had a little problem with Laura Charles in this 1985 cult classic.

At the beginning of the movie, Laura's manager is begging her to play a tape. He tells her a man named Eddie Arcadian will hurt him if he doesn't get it played. He is literally terrified and begging. You can see he is terrified.

Laura actually says to him, "My life isn't filled with all that...... Drama." That's how she says it, she pauses before the word drama. Think about how dismissive that is. He is scared for his life and tells her as much, and she just says something that dismissive. Then she berates him like it is his fault he is in the situation. And the kicker is, she says her life isn't filled with all "of that drama" for two reasons. She liked the idea of it. The idea of thinking she was this person with no drama. And because she didn't care because it didn't affect her.

So the movie goes on. Now Laura is in danger of Eddie. It was all because Eddie wanted the tape played. There wasn't any "drama" in her life that caused it. But does she stop and realize that? Nope. Does she for one second think, "Gee maybe it wasn't my manager's fault he was in this situation. I wonder if he is okay?" Nope. She suddenly cares because it affects her.

And then everything in the end works out for her of course. And we never know if Eddie killed the manager or what happened to him. Laura never even looked for him to even just apologize, let alone make sure he wasn't dead.

What are your thoughts?

This movie absolutely destroyed me.

To be fair, I am very affected by the sadness and trauma of others, so it's not surprising that this movie almost killed me. To borrow from a comment I made on another user's post "This movie was a 2 hour long gut punch, and the end was a fever dream." It was so very traumatic, exhausting, uncomfortable, and TERRIFYING. And traditional horror movies do not ever scare me.

My overwhelming feeling for most of the movie was profound sadness. This family torn apart, the horrible things they say and think... the panic attack that Peter has and when he asks his friend to hold his hand? That was one of the times I actually cried. His numb stupor after his sisters head gets knocked off by a telephone pole(!!!!!). His mother's screams when she finds her headless daughter in the back of the car. The desperation when Steve splashes Annie in the face with water. The two times (one reality, one dream) Annie says just awful things to Peter. Peter smashing his face into the desk. Peter screaming/pleading "Mommy!" as Annie tries to get into the attic after him. These are all times I felt overwhelming sadness. Tons of other feelings: anger, disgust, terror, etc. But huge amounts of sadness that I've never felt during other horror movies.

Let me preface this by saying I know what the director has said about his vision and "what the movie really means." But I've never cared about a movie enough to actually fundamentally disagree with the person who created it before. self-deprecating eyeroll

This movie as a straightforward demon-possession/ occult movie does nothing for me. The whole time I had no doubt that it was a family torn apart by mental illness and that devastated and terrified me.

I'm going to post my inexpert interpretation as a comment. It won't be a synopsis, but there will be oodles of spoilers.

*Edit: I thought the movie was great. I don't know if I'll ever see it again.

Boy howdy. This movie.

I like dinosaurs. A lot. Jurassic Park is probably my favorite movie of all time. So whenever a movie that focuses on dinosaurs comes around, I'll give it a look. I was stocked that the Jurassic franchise was coming back in 2015, and I went on my first date with my girlfriend to see it. So while it wasn't the best movie of all time, it holds a special place in my heart.

That being said, this movie kinda sucks. I managed to find a copy online to check it out, because I was worried about the quality and I don't have money to spend willy nilly, so I figured if I liked what I saw I'd just pay money to see it in a theater later. However, after watching it I can say that unless my girlfriend really wants to see this movie, I don't think I'll fork over the cash to watch it in a theater.

There are good bits to this movie, so I'll start there.

• The dinosaurs look fucking fantastic. Even though I was watching a shitty cam of the movie, I could see the quality, time, and love that went into each creature in this movie and the CGI meshed nearly perfectly with the animatronics that at times it was difficult to tell when one ended and the other began. They are the best they've ever looked.

• The Indoraptor, despite it's stupid name, is fucking cool. It was intimidating and scary, with a solid visual design. It stalked through the third act of the movie with malice and menace.

• Christ Pratt Christ Pratt's his way through this movie. Tons of charm as usual, though even he can't save this train wreck.

• There were a few beautiful shots and fun set pieces, with one shot in particular actually making me a little emotional. You'll know it when you see it.

• Several fun homages to the first film. Nothing special, but the way some parts were shot and framed had me going, "Oh, it was just like that in the first one!"

Now on to the bad:

• This movie has no sense of what it wants to be. Each of the three acts seem to come from entirely different movie ideas. It goes from serious to lighthearted to shockingly dark at the drop of a hat, and there's no real sense of coherence to the plot.

• The villains are cartoon characters and weak and pointless at best, and literally the stupidest mother fuckers on the planet at the worst. You'll know who I'm talking about when you see it.

• The side characters are all pointless and serve more as diversity ticks on some corporate stooges "Focus Group" checklist than as actual characters. Are you ready to see the same "Not Richard Ayoade from the IT crowd" black nerd "hack the mainframe" bit you've seen a hundred times before? How about "tough opinionated alt-chick"? who doesn't take shit and is totally capable? The actors are fine for their parts and I mean no disrespect to them, but their characters feel like such cookie-cutter "side characters" that I just finished the movie and have already forgotten their names.

• Speaking of side characters, the little girl in this movie is actually fine. She's a good actress and much less annoying than the kids in the last movie (and most of the kids in Jurassic Park movies for that matter), but they do something with her that is so baffling and out of nowhere that it just screams, "WE WANTED A TWIST BECAUSE THE KIDS LOVE TWISTS". It has no bearing on the plot at all aside from "justifying" a characters horrible and frankly nearly psychotic decision towards the end of the movie. Again, the young actress does a great job with what little she was given and I feel given a better script she can definitely shine.

Honestly, there's a ton of other little things I could nitpick at this movie for, but those above are definitely the biggest flaws I feel this movie has. You can tell that there as a solid idea behind this movie, but that idea got buried under a mountain of other ideas that were all meshed together into a weird goulash of a movie. This things reeks of "directed by comity".

Overall, there are so many eye-rolling moments in this film, coupled with a weak plot, dialogue, and side characters that even the always charming Chris Pratt and some killer dinosaur effects can't save it.

5/10. If you like dinosaurs and wanna see the best ones you're likely to get for a while, feel free to check your brain out at the door and enjoy at a matinee. Otherwise, don't expect to enjoy this movie if you're hoping for something more than Transformers without the sexism, racism, and dinosaurs instead of robots.

If ya'll have any questions, ask away. I'll try to avoid overt spoilers though, so I'll do my best to answer as vaguely as possible.

Solo is not doing so hot in the theaters right now, despite the good reviews. Here's hoping that positive word-of-mouth can save it. But what I've noticed online is a huge amount of people placing most of the blame on the divisiveness of The Last Jedi. While I never claimed that the Last Jedi was a perfect movie and it definitely has some serious flaws, I feel like the hate train for that movie is hugely overblown online compared to what actual people out in the real world think. So I figured I'd check in here and see what the general opinions are on The Last Jedi.

EDIT: shit, anyway I can fix that title?

Have any of you seen Solo? Possible spoilers if not.

Personally, I loved it. After having been dissapointed by The Last Jedi, Solo was refreshing, in my opinion it felt like a classic Star Wars film. I loved all the characters, including Ehrenreich's potrayal of Han which I fully bought.

Also the humour, compared to The Last Jedi, was far better. Whilst there weren't many laugh out loud moments, I was grinning throughout. And I far preferred it to the eye rolling cheesy jokes of TLJ.

And as someone who has watched the Clone Wars and Rebels series, I loved the reveal of that certain character.

Of course there were some cons, but they were relatively minor, in my opinion. The opening was a bit rough, and I got a bit confused at the end with the constant changing sides. And to be honest, I didn't really care for Marauders.

What did you guys think?