B. C

Doctor Strange 2 is about as direct to video as it gets. It felt like watching budget Disney sequels during the 90s. It was fun and enjoyable but also clunky, predictable and clearly made for streaming which made it mildly disappointing to watch in theaters. I enjoyed it but I wouldn’t recommend it unless you have time to kill in your pajamas.

This movie is an instant classic. From the very first scene I was blown away by how good it was. I laughed and wept sometimes simultaneously. Immensely clever and fun. I was worried going in that it would be confusing or convoluted but it wasn’t at all. I was able to follow the emotional beats through all the zany shenanigans just fine. All you need to enjoy this movie is an open mind. It was incredibly touching and heartfelt. I loved every minute of it. All the actors did a fabulous job. I would easy see this again and I can’t wait for home release so I can add it to my movie collection. I could talk for hours about how cool this movie is. Absolutely a must see for 2022.

I’m sure this will make a lot of fans upset but Pepper Ann is a 3 star show. It’s not by any means a bad cartoon. It’s decent. It’s has a nostalgic art style, cute cleverly written characters and good theming but it’s painfully boring. It was when I watched it as a kid and it remains so upon rewatching it on Disney+. Pepper Ann is the kind of cartoon I used to sit through to get to the “good cartoons.” It just doesn’t have enough on its own to stand out in the landscape of animation—especially today. It plays it too safe and the end result while charming is lackluster and forgettable. It doesn’t play with its satire or social commentary like other shows that aired at the same time nor does it push the visual envelope enough to be memorable. I can’t see it being interesting enough to engage kids nor does it have enough to engage parents beyond a few “heh I see what you did there” moments. It’s just a very bland tame cartoon that hasn’t aged as well as others in it’s genre. Just like the theme song you think “oh yeah it’s whats her face…who is she again?” Watching it I’m reminded of all the other cartoons I could be watching that do what Pepper Ann does but better. A good portion of which are also on Disney+. Unfortunately Pepper Ann isn’t much more than it’s nostalgia and in that sense it feels like watching filler. Boring forgettable filler.

Ghostbusters Afterlife is a fun casual movie experience that I enjoyed watching. It doesn’t take itself too seriously and has a similar vibe to interactive dinner theatre. What I mean by that is that it’s best enjoyed by someone who is willing to relax and enjoy it. I come from a household of super fans. We’ve watched all the movies and the cartoon. Ghostbusters Afterlife isn’t anything particularly groundbreaking but it is fun and it made me laugh. That’s what a Ghostbusters movie should be. It’s a fine addition to the franchise.

I had a great time watching Eternals. For a movie that had to dump a baker’s dozen worth of characters and exposition in my lap it still managed to be lighthearted and fun to watch. There were moments when I was genuinely touched and shed a tear. I loved how natural all the representation felt. This movie did it right. Nobody felt like a token anything. They just felt relatable. The sign language and multiple languages were done so seamlessly I hardly noticed them. I was impressed. I definitely enjoyed it and recommend it. It’s a great movie to see in theaters.

Dune is definitely a sand dune of a movie. It’s completely tedious and tiring to get through. The cinematography is a joke. Half the run time is people briskly walking, ships slowly ascending and descending, and people standing or sitting moodily in the center of the frame. Every single person, object and action is framed right smack dab in the center of the screen throughout the film which means that even the most intense moments have all the emotional impact of a PowerPoint presentation. If watching a two hour long slide show of a desert sounds fun to you then this is your movie. It’s really such a shame because the movie has everything else going for it. Great world design, good costumes, decent acting and writing. If you close your eyes and listen to just the audio it’s a pretty good adaptation of Dune but as soon as you open your eyes it scatters in the wind. What’s left is a film that confuses and disappoints its audience. I’ve left very few movies in recent years where I heard actual disgruntlement from exiting patrons. This movie is unfortunately one of them. Such a shame. It could have been epic if only something had actually happened.

Carole and Tuesday hits a lot of high notes as a show about relationships but sometimes loses it’s rhythm when it comes to other aspects of the show. The two main leads Carole and Tuesday carry the first season through their sheer chemistry alone. Whether with each other or with the rest of their entourage, the two characters shine in any language you chose to watch them in. However when you widen your focus to the rest of the show some elements can be rather jarring. While Carole and Tuesday portrays homosexuality refreshingly naturally with its lesbian characters it also simultaneously continues the uncomfortable trend in anime of using transsexual characters as comedic devices which at times can be more than a little uncomfortable (here’s looking at you Mersisters...) and is a disappointing snafu considering how respectful the show is regarding other elements. The show is well animated and expressive which can sometimes be to its own detriment as it makes the heavily rotoscoped musical/ dance performance segments seem artificial and out of place. The choice of keeping the english voicework for all singing segments regardless of language setting can make the performances seem even more out of place if you’re watching in anything other than English. (I watched primarily in Japanese with subtitles and the singing voices were extremely different from their japanese dub talking voices). Despite these small hiccups Carole and Tuesday is an entertaining and unique anime that I enjoyed and would like to see continued. I greatly anticipate season two. I think with a little more polish the show could be a real gem.

Fuse: Memoirs of a Hunter Girl is a heavily nuanced film that will confuse American audiences who are not familiar with the many layers of meaning common in Japanese literature. The film is so heavy on the allegory that sometimes it feels more like the kind of story found in a college Literature class than a fantasy anime. Everything is Fuse is a metaphor and it’s “plot” is just a device to frame the metaphysical journey of the protagonist Hajami. Hunting demons is mearly a distraction. Hajami’s real persuit through out the film is her femininity as she blossoms into a woman. Somehow the film is both simultaneously too subtle and heavy-handed with its metaphors for womanhood which can make some scenes, such as the Kabuki performance or the inexplicable appearance of the mystic sword during the climax, feel disjointed. Even if I personally was too American to get many of the metaphors, I still enjoyed the film. It was entertaining, well paced and the chemistry between Hajami and Shino is some top notch AMV material.

The King is easily one of worst high budget documentaries of 2017 and a perfect visual example of mansplaining. Disjointed and rambling in a way that is already hopelessly outdated, The King is a prime example of a Hollywood vanity project. While this documentary doesn’t stick the landing on its metaphorical analysis of American Imperialism, it definitely makes clear that collectors are not synonymous with experts. Owning cars owned by Elvis hardly makes one an expert on the man and play acting president on late night TV also hardly makes one a political scholar. The deficiencies show. Plenty of editing talent was wasted on this project. There were engaging moments-the cinematography was butter smooth, the sound design flawless. Even the segments on Elvis are engaging for the casual fan but unfortunately even the best efforts fall flat when crushed under the weight of enormous egos. Hilariously the documentary provides it’s own visual metaphors with which to mock it. In particular the Rolls Royce grey poupon scene used to illustrate Elvis’s differences from something that wasn’t interesting enough to care about also perfectly illustrates the reality of the project. Two snobbish old white men in nice cars who think they know everything. Skip this documentary if you like well crafted social commentary and impartial information on American Imperialism but if you just want to laugh at Alec Baldwin outside of SNL then give it a go. I had a blast.